


The Red Wheelbarrow

by Joules Mer (joulesmer)



Series: Strange Courage [1]
Category: Star Trek: Alternate Original Series (Movies)
Genre: Caring Bones, Eventual Kirk/McCoy, Friends to Lovers, Getting Together, James T. Kirk & Spock Friendship, M/M, Recovery, Sickness, Star Trek: Into Darkness, Tarsus IV, Temporary Character Death, radiation poisoning
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-02-11
Updated: 2018-03-30
Packaged: 2019-03-17 00:43:39
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 9
Words: 39,772
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13647843
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/joulesmer/pseuds/Joules%20Mer
Summary: Most galling of all, in Leonard McCoy’s opinion, was that Jim didn’t even look like he should be dead.  The unnatural stillness, however, made the doctor concede all that was left to do was sign the death certificate and append his resignation.  Two weeks later the world had shifted again, but barely dead or not, recovery from radiation poisoning is a long uncertain road.  It may force Kirk and McCoy to talk about that-thing-they-don’t-talk-about and Spock… ever since a dying wish of prosperity and long-life pressed against containment glass he’s been able to sense something he can’t quite explain.





	1. Hope

**Author's Note:**

> My first foray in TOS/AOS so feedback very much welcome. The title is from the twenty-second poem in the medical doctor William Carlos William’s volume of poetry, Spring and All. The poems referred to later in the work are the first (By the Road to the Contagious Hospital) and the title piece, conceived of while looking out the window as he cared for a critically ill child.

Most galling of all, in Leonard McCoy’s opinion, was that Kirk didn’t even look like he should be dead. With bloodshot eyes hidden behind closed lids, the radiation burns on his face could be dismissed as sunburn; the minor scrapes from a day surfing. Christ, he’d looked worse after a bar fight. Only the terrible stillness set McCoy’s doctor’s nerves jangling. People were never that still; not when they were alive. All that was left to do was sign the death certificate and append his resignation. Scotty made a choked noise that seemed to come from somewhere far away, largely drowned out by the rushing in his ears.

Jim looked fine. God, he looked better than fine. He looked perfect; like he always did. McCoy was suddenly restless, arms hanging helplessly as a wave of nausea ploughed into him. He was going to be sick, right there, in front of the hushed crowd of crew. He had to move.

Wandering over to a chair his eyes started to burn as soon as he sat down, raising a hand to his face as if he could hold back the tears through will alone. His diaphragm was constricting, painfully, a sob building that wasn’t going to be suppressed, but despite the crowd of crew lingering in the background he couldn’t bring himself to care. Jim was gone, and that whatever-they-had that they didn’t talk about was gone with him. It was more than he could bear. 

A soft purr caught his attention and the doctor blinked back tears to turn to the desk in disbelief. Disbelief that turned to a bolt of adrenaline and then a surge of hope as the monitor showed the unthinkable. The doctor almost didn’t recognize his own voice as he yelled, “Get me a cryotube! Now!”

A flurry of activity and then they were transferring Kirk into the cyrotube, hope burning more brightly than it had any right to. _I promise_ , he said to Jim, without speaking, _I promise I’ll get you back from this._ The cryotube sealed with a hiss and he tried to think of anything but the odds that he could pull this off.

Time seemed to speed up then, until suddenly he had a vial of Khan’s blood in his hand and despite Spock being there too no one was saying anything about ethics or the Hippocratic oath. The cryotube was right there, waiting. McCoy knew he should do this at Starfleet Medical, where the advanced life support systems were unparalleled and the gravity wasn’t liable to go offline. But with Vengeance smouldering on the surface he didn’t know if there even was a Starfleet Medical building anymore, or how they could possibly get down. Not to mention that attempted resurrection was generally frowned upon in the medical establishment. 

So he swallowed down his fears and prepared the serum as best as he could guess. Humans and tribbles were not the same, and ordinary degradation of a corpse was different from severe radiation damage, but it had been a simple platelet solution before so that was what he’d try again. He’d cleared the room of all the gawkers and onlookers. Only Spock and a trusted nurse were left when the centrifuge chimed and spin down, disgorging a preparation ready for infusion. The private surgery suite kept them shielded from prying eyes.

“Open the cryotube and put him on a biobed.” McCoy’s voice sounded rough, raw, even to his own ears. It was Spock who complied, opening the tube and lifting the captain’s body over to the bed. The bio monitors remained quiet and unresponsive and damned if that wasn’t jarring even when he’d known to expect it. 

Kirk’s skin was cold. Spock gently tipped the man’s head from where it had initially fallen into a more comfortable looking position. As if it made a difference now. The Vulcan’s own words from so long ago ran through his mind: the captain cannot cheat death. Barely suppressed emotion roiled and twisted inside him, clamouring for release. _In accepting the inevitable, one finds peace._ The normally comforting proverb from his childhood taunted him.

The nurse readied the supplies McCoy had demanded, no idea what he’d actually need. “Well.” Looking up to meet the Vulcan’s eyes, McCoy connected the infusion line, trying to ignore the acceleration of his heart as he did so, “Here we go.” They watched in silence as the serum snaked through the tubing, finally entering the the central line protruding from the captain’s chest. One minute. Two minutes. He’d made it stronger than what he’d injected into the tribble, and was injecting it under pressure in hopes of pushing it through the bloodstream. More platelets relative to body weight. Five minutes. Should he put Kirk back into the cryotube? Every minute out and the capacity to regain brain function would be increasingly compromised… if there was still a chance at all. 

Ten minutes, and the doctor was suddenly aware that he was gripping the edge of the desk so tightly his hands had turned white. Worse, his nurse was starting to hover. Checking unchanged readings, reorganizing supplies, unwilling to voice her increasing skepticism but conveying it nonetheless. Spock was still standing ramrod straight, gaze occasionally oscillating between the monitors and the captain’s face.

Forty-five minutes, and a monitor hummed to life. Not vital signs, not yet, but something was happening. McCoy held his breath so long he started to feel lightheaded, then with a soft beep the vital levels began to rise. Slowly, creeping upwards, faltering, then rising again.

“Well I’ll be god-damned.” McCoy whipped out a hand scanner, repeating his words when the readings began to come in, “Well I’ll be _god-damned_.”

“Doctor?” Spock couldn’t contain himself; his emotional control frayed and threatening to snap all over again.

“Just wait, dammit!” Running the scan again and comparing the results made the atmosphere suddenly so thin that he had to gasp before managing to say, “It’s working, Spock. He’s not alive yet, but the tissue is regenerating.” Waving urgently, he ordered, “I need a cardiostimulator and a cortical stimulator.”

The nurse hurried to comply and with two jolts from the stimulator a third vital monitor began to indicate a pulse: weak, thready, but becoming more regular. McCoy’s vision suddenly blurred. Tears, he realized, Jesus, the nervous system was a strange thing. Swiping at his eyes he managed to get his vision to clear in time to see Kirk’s chest move in a weak attempt to draw in air. The pulmonary support unit kicked in then, trying to regulate a semblance of normal lung function.

“Doctor?” Spock had stepped closer, and the word came out a near whisper.

McCoy had to clear his throat in order to reply, “He’s coming back, Spock.”

“Do we know…” Spock trailed off, unsure what to ask. Brain function? Nerve damage? Would the captain actually wake up, just like that?

“It’s safe to say I don’t know anything, Spock. Technically speaking, this is impossible.” McCoy could only watch the monitors and hope. The vitals were weak, but present. Cellular damage slowly reversing. The radiation effects had been catastrophic: delicate tissues liquified; myelin stripped from nerve fibres; massive hemorrhaging. Brain activity was still well below normal. Even if the remaining cells were regenerated, massive amounts of waste would have to be cleared out. Muscle loss was likely inevitable. Whether Jim, himself, was still in there… the doctor didn’t know.

The levels eventually hit the bottom end of the normal range and McCoy felt ready to sing. Elation was short lived; before he could announce the good news an alarm began to sound. He consulted the hand scanner and swore, “Shit!” Another alarm joined and created a wailing chorus that his cursing joined, Shit, shit shit!” Kirk’s body temperature had reached normal then overshot, hitting forty degrees celsius and continuing to rise. Grabbing a hypospray, McCoy dialed a dosage and injected it to no effect.

“Doctor?” The nurse this time, maintaining a veneer of calm but clearly agitated.

“His temperature’s out of control. If this keeps up it’s going to cook his brain before he has a chance to come out of it…” Sweat was standing out on the captain’s face and his skin was flushing a bright red. “It’s got to be a reaction to the transfusion, but…”

A third alarm barely managed to beep a warning before Kirk convulsed, violently, a seizure of grand mal proportions that had McCoy desperately order the Vulcan, “Make sure he doesn’t fall off the bed!” As Spock hurried to comply the doctor grabbed another drug, loading the hypospray and having to try twice before he managed to inject it into the moving target. The seizure intensified until the captain’s limbs were extended, almost too rigid to jerk as they lifted from the surface of the bed. After a minute with no effect, McCoy tried another anticonvulsant, then another until he didn’t dare try a fourth for fear of causing a dangerous interaction. Yellowish froth flecked with blood began to pour out of the captain’s mouth and nose, smearing over Spock’s hands where he was helping to ride out the convulsions. The seizure continued for over an hour, enough to cause brain damage on its own even as they resorted to cold gel blankets in an effort to control the fever. The seizure only abated to be replaced by a sudden swelling and a monitor that flashed a warning: cytokine release syndrome. 

Too exhausted to even swear again, McCoy loaded another hypospray and pressed it to the abused skin at the captain’s throat. “Cytokine storm.” He loaded another as he said, “It’s a systemic inflammatory response. There can be a recurrence of symptoms even if it seems to initially improve.” Kirk’s face had swollen so violently his features were obliterated, eyes vanishing and lips stretching. He began to hemorrhage, blood leaking from the corners of his eyes and nose. Another drug finally seemed to have an effect; not enough to reverse the swelling, but at least stop its progress. 

“Dammit, Jim,” McCoy whispered under his breath as he furiously consulted the scanner, “Don’t let this be my last memory of you.” Another hour and two more drugs later and the deadly swelling subsided, ever so slightly. The vital readings seemed to settle somewhere outside of normal, but far away from dead. The stimulators and support units were still fully active, maintaining the tenuous hold on life. Brain activity was minimal and erratic, but, perhaps, becoming more normal again. McCoy was suddenly aware it was very bright in the medical bay. He was sweating like he’d run an ill-advised marathon and the monitors seemed to shimmer and blur in front of him. Swiping a sleeve over his eyes, the doctor tried to regain focus.

“Doctor?” 

Spock, he realized. He blinked, hard, and found the Vulcan appear across the biobed, regarding him with one raised eyebrow.

The Vulcan’s control seemed to be returning, as he merely quirked his head to one side and asked, “Are you all right, Doctor?”

He wasn’t all right. He wouldn’t be all right until Jim was climbing off the biobed, smiling, teasing him. That’s when he remembered that the body on the biobed was alive and the realization hit him like a ton of bricks. Swollen beyond recognition, yes, but alive. Whether the captain would remain that way, or whether he would ever really be _Jim_ again was unclear, but it was a damned sight better than dead. Stumbling slightly, McCoy moved to sit down heavily in a chair, having to suck hard to breathe past a wave of tunnel vision.

A hand settled on his shoulder, anchoring him in the present. He forced himself to take more measured breaths until his vision cleared and he found it was Spock standing beside the chair. That the famously touch-shy Vulcan would offer comfort in that manner was the second miracle of the day. The nurse had busied herself consulting the monitors, deliberately busy on the other side of the room. Glancing up at the vital monitors, McCoy couldn’t suppress a swell of something warm in his chest. “He’s alive, Spock. His body, at least. Brain function,” he waved a hand at the monitor, “it’s not normal, yet, we won’t know if he’s a vegetable until things settle down more. And the cytokine storm could kick off again, even with treatment.”

“But there is hope?”

Leveraging himself out of the chair, he replied, “A glimmer.” A glance at the monitors confirmed they’d been treating Kirk non-stop for almost five hours, and it was six since they’d opened the body bag. 

Spock seemed to be having the same realization as well, straightening his already straight back as he softly said, “I must return to the bridge and report to Starfleet.” After a moment’s pause he asked, “What shall I tell the bridge crew?”

McCoy swallowed, nervously, “Tell them to hope.”

The Vulcan seemed to bid a brief, silent goodbye to the captain, then strode from the medical facility. The vital monitors appeared to be holding steady, so McCoy dismissed the nurse, telling her to help tend to the more minor injuries and ensure someone was on standby.

Kirk was still terribly swollen, skin mottled and flushed, but the whirr of the pulmonary support system confirmed that he was, for now, alive.

The area was a mess: discarded hypo ampoules littered the floor, the bed was smeared with fluids he didn’t want to think about, and although the captain was covered from the waist-down the scent of sweat, blood, and urine was suddenly strong. 

With a sigh, McCoy fetched a basin of warm water and a stack of clean cloths, rolled over a table to set them on, then peeled back the soiled sheets and discarded them in the corner. Bending over his patient, he began to gently wash the abused body and in a conversational undertone, said, “I don’t think I’ve done this since medical school, you know. You should consider yourself honored.”

There were bloody tears crusted in the corners of Jim’s eyes, still distorted by swelling. Wetting a clean cloth, he gently rubbed them away, then swiped the cloth through the cropped hair for good measure. Arms, hands, the curve of a collarbone, a grossly swollen abdomen that obscured the muscles underneath. He wished he could just wash away the illness and damage as he went. Another cloth for another region and he sighed, “This is why I have nurses, Jim. I know you’d probably prefer one, but you’re stuck with me.” One eyebrow raised at what he found, “So that didn’t escape the swelling either. You poor bastard.”

It was a methodical process, one more akin to meditation than work and he welcomed the chance to empty his mind and focus on the task at hand. One more gentle swipe across the instep of Jim’s right foot and he set down the cloth before fetching a new blanket and carefully covering the other man. Standing by the head of the bed, confronted by the still distorted features yet reassured by the vital monitors, a tear finally fell. First one, then another, and a gasping sob eventually rocked his frame despite clenching his teeth, hard.

He’d known this was always a possibility: Jim dying. Every red alert or frantic hail from an away mission going wrong always set his nerves on edge, the possibility clamouring from where he kept it firmly pushed to the back of his mind. Over time the fear had never truly diminished, but instead become something he’d habituated to; like music in the next room that remained at the edges of perception. Today that complacency had stretched and broken, and the doctor’s world felt as if it was misaligned on its axis in a way that only Jim could put back.

Several decks away, the turbolift doors to the bridge slid open just as Spock realized he should have changed his shirt. Glancing down confirmed that there were smears of sweat, blood, and unknown fluids marking the uniform. It was too late, however, as all eyes had turned to the doors. Squaring his shoulders, the Vulcan stepped onto the damaged bridge, casting his gaze over the crew, still at their stations so many hours later, as he asked, “Status?”

Sulu answered, standing to relinquish the command chair as he gave his report. “We’re in a stable orbit, sir. Engineering reports systems are heavily damaged, but stable. Casualty reports are twenty-one confirmed dead, 35 reporting major injuries, and three unknown. Casualty estimates on the ground are upwards of fifteen thousand, but nothing is being confirmed. Starfleet has asked us to hold position if we can, as a state of emergency has been declared in San Francisco. Admiral Archer last checked-in almost an hour ago, and has asked you to provide an update, when possible.”

“Spock?” Nyota said his name with such hesitation the Vulcan felt the newly regained control on his emotions flicker. 

Chekov’s gaze slid down to the stains on his commander’s shirt and the young navigator blanched.

Standing next to the chair, Jim’s chair, rather than sitting, Spock forced himself to meet his crewmates’ gaze as he softly said, “The doctor believes we should permit ourselves to hope.”

“Can we see him?” Uhura swiped at her eyes and hurried to continue, “Or at least Scotty? He’s been working so hard, but…” She couldn’t even bring herself to describe the look on the engineer’s face.

“Jim’s condition is… unstable.” Spock knew the doctor wouldn’t want anyone underfoot as he continued to manage the captain’s condition. Not to mention that the familiar features were still almost unrecognizable. “We will have to wait until he is medically cleared for visitors.” 

He could sense their hurt, and fear, but ever the professional crew they acquiesced and turned back to their duties.


	2. Meddling

Six days. McCoy fell into the chair in his small office attached to the critical care unit, dizzy with exhaustion. They’d transferred down to Starfleet Medical twelve hours after the transfusion and he had yet to leave. Since then there had been a further cytokine storm, seizures, and days where waves of fever left Jim’s body drenched in sweat. Muscle tissue that had initially responded well to the transfusion was now rapidly wasting from the continued abuse. Worst of all, Jim’s brain activity was still erratic. 

Pressing his forehead to the cool surface of the table, McCoy considered whether he needed another cup of coffee or a stimulant injection. 

“Respectfully, sir, you look like shit.”

M’Benga. McCoy looked up to find his second regarding him from the doorway, a sympathetic smile on the other doctor’s face. 

Groaning, McCoy stretched and felt his joints pop as he said, “I’ll overlook the insubordination. But just this time, as you’re probably right.”

“You need to get some rest, Len, or I’ll have to start treating you too.”

“I’m fine. I just--” 

Cutting off his CMO, M’Benga broke in, “No, you’re superstitious.” McCoy’s mouth closed with a click and a frown knotted his brow as the other man continued, “It’s understandable. It happens to me too, on the hard cases. But you’re not going to be able to help him if you collapse too.”

McCoy’s frown deepened, even as he acknowledged the truth of the other man’s words with a brief nod.

“He’ll be fine while you’re gone; and I’ll be right here the whole time. It’s been over twenty-four hours since the last fever and two days since a seizure.”

“His cytokines…”

Cutting off the other man again, M’Benga reminded him, “Are being managed. And systemic cellular disruption is my specialty.” Relenting, he offered, “If you won’t actually leave, I’ve set up an empty patient room for you. I’ll call you if anything changes in the captain’s condition.”

Outmanoeuvred, McCoy hauled himself out of the chair, passing over a padd with the latest charting before shuffling down the hallway to the guest room. Sinking into the bed, he was vaguely aware he should have showered first, but sleep came almost immediately.

 

**********

Twelve days and McCoy was finally allowing himself to hope. Really hope. The transfusion reactions had ceased and supportive therapies shifted to nerve regeneration and trying to minimize loss of muscle mass, rather than simply keeping the body alive. Spock had visited most days, but the others had been kept away. It was still too tenuous; too uncertain. Now, however, the last twenty-four hours had convinced him that Jim was likely still there-- at least to some degree as brain activity slowly returned to something resembling a scan from a previous convalescence. 

McCoy’s medical whites were soft and, remarkably, clean. After almost two weeks of blood and sweat it was a palpable relief. A soft moan caught his attention, followed by a spike in gamma activity on the cortical monitor. Stepping over to the head of the bed, McCoy tried to slow the thumping of his own heart as he asked, “Jim?”

The captain’s heart rate accelerated, eyes moving under closed lids as he gave a soft moan that turned into a whine.

“Jim?’ McCoy asked, more firmly, “Jim can you open your eyes?”

There was a hitch in Kirk’s breathing, then nothing. It was as if he’d sunk back to a state of more limited consciousness.

Sighing, McCoy finished his charting and lowered the blinds on the window so the light wouldn’t shine directly onto his patient’s closed eyes. Just in case, he reminded himself. His stomach rumbled and he set the bed to remote monitoring, keying in alarms to signal any change for the worse. A sandwich; he could manage a sandwich. Maybe some of that not terrible soup the canteen had been serving recently.

Hand on the door, a faint mumble made him freeze: “How's our ship?”

The doctor spun around, stomach twisting as he looked to his patient, “Jim?” Four quick steps and he was back to the head of the bed, eyes flicking back and forth across the other man’s face as he asked, “Can you hear me?”

Kirk’s face remained slack, and his next mumbled words didn’t make sense, “You used what he wanted against him. That's a nice move.” McCoy had to lean down to hear and frowned as he tried to understand.

After a moment, the captain continued, slurring, “S’what you’d have done.”

With that McCoy realized this wasn’t a dream, but a memory. One side of a conversation…

The next sentence was indistinct, but what followed was crystal clear and made knots twist in the doctor’s belly, “I'm scared, Spock. Help me not be. How do you choose not to feel?”

McCoy exhaled, heavily, “Jesus, Jim.” He peeled up an eyelid and there was no reaction, no attempt to keep the eye open or flinch away from the light.

Jim’s voice became even more thin and reedy, a faint imitation of his normal tones as he whispered, “I want you to know why I couldn't let you die. Why I went back for you.” 

“Because you are my friend.” Spock’s voice from the doorway just about gave the doctor a heart attack. McCoy reared up from where he was bent over the head of the bed, twisting to meet the Vulcan’s eyes. Taking a hesitant step into the room, Spock asked, “He is… not awake?”

“No. Not really. He’s been getting closer for the last day or so; more like dreaming. These are the first words though.”

Spock’s eyebrows drew together, “He dreams of his death?”

McCoy had known, deep down, what was being recounted, but the confirmation shook him nonetheless. Nodding, jerkily, he turned back and ran a hand scanner over the other man, watching as the readings subsided. “He’s back down again.”

“Is he likely to wake soon?”

Biting the inside of his cheek, McCoy considered for a moment before shaking his head. “I don’t think so. Not until tomorrow, at the earliest, perhaps the day after.” If he properly wakes up at all, went unsaid. They were so damn close, but until Jim actually opened his eyes McCoy was not ready to count anything as certain.

“Then, Doctor, you can join me for a meal.”

Outmanoeuvred once again, McCoy checked that the remote monitoring on his padd was working and acquiesced without complaint.

 

**********

The following day had started with great promise, but turned into another frustrating wait. The captain’s brain activity continued to normalize, but aside from several instances of mumbled dreams there hadn’t been a return to consciousness. Until that happened, until Jim woke up and smiled at him, the doctor wasn’t going to let himself celebrate. He’d seen close cases before: where an apparent recovery never fully materialized and hope eventually turned to tragedy all over again. Despite the promising scans, and the fact that Spock had seemed to recognize the mumbled words of the day before, McCoy couldn’t quite experience relief. Not yet. My pessimistic nature, he thought to himself. It’s a damned good thing Jim can be the optimist for the both of us.

He’d spent the night in a nearby room, just in case; remote monitors connected to a padd placed by the head of his bed because he was not going to let Jim wake up alone. Not after _dying_.

The scans the next morning convinced him that today was going to be the day they would know for sure. Spock seemed to have sensed it as well, somehow, because with typical Vulcan good timing he appeared in the door just as McCoy was adjusting the blinds to let in some light but carefully block out the damaged skyline.

As they watched, the cortical monitor showed a steady gaining of consciousness, real consciousness. McCoy felt his mouth go dry— afraid Jim’s eyes would open but memory and personality wouldn’t be there. 

Scrutinizing, closely, McCoy knew from the way Jim returned to consciousness that he was still there: eyes flickering under closed lids in the final throes of dreaming, two ragged breaths as his eyes shot open and took in his surroundings, then looking around before flopping his head to one side when his gaze landed on the doctor.

With a surge of relief everything he could or should have said vanished and McCoy blurted out, “Oh, don't be so melodramatic. You were barely dead.” He waved a hand scanner over the other man and busied himself consulting the results to avoid an embarrassing display of emotion as he continued, “It was the transfusion that really took its toll. You were out cold for two weeks.”

Confused blue eyes struggled to track for a moment, then the captain’s gaze focused and in a husky voice he whispered, “Transfusion?”

McCoy couldn’t remember hearing a better word come out of Jim’s mouth. Masking a grimace of distaste, he explained, “Your cells were heavily irradiated. We had no choice.”

“Khan?” Jim’s voice was almost creaky from disuse, but there was an exhausted energy behind it nonetheless.

And that in itself was good to hear, because it meant that Jim remembered. “Once we caught him, I synthesized a serum from his superblood.” Unable to resist a joke because after all that stress he was here with _Jim_ he added, “Tell me: are you feeling homicidal? Power mad? Despotic?”

And Jim, of course, responded just in kind: “No more than usual.” He blinked as if he was having trouble keeping his eyes open, “How'd you catch him?”

That reminded McCoy he needed to relinquish his monopoly on the other man. Stepping to the side, and back, he admitted, “I didn’t.”

Looking past the doctor, a small smile alighted on Jim’s lips, “You saved my life.”

Recalibrating a hand scanner, McCoy couldn’t resist a hissed aside, “Uhura and I had something to do with it, too, you know.”

There was an expression on the normally impassive face. A faint twisting of lips and something in the brown eyes that could have been the half-Vulcan equivalent of a smile. “You saved my life, Captain, and the lives of…”

Cutting his officer off, Jim tiredly interjected, “Spock, just… Thank you.”

An understanding seemed to pass between them, as Spock merely replied, “You are welcome, Jim.”

The captain’s smile broadened, even as he began to blink hard in an effort to stay awake. Whatever words he wanted to say were lost in a tired mumble, eyes slipping closed. The monitors changed colour to indicate sleep… a stable, healing sleep. 

McCoy made it three steps out of the room before breaking down, right there in the corridor, the second the door swung shut behind him. Sliding down the wall as his legs suddenly refused to carry his weight, Leonard McCoy had never felt so old.

He felt numb. Empty. As if the last weeks had scoured him out and left him with just a deep ache inside. It was a crazy way to feel, when he should have been ready to rejoice with relief.

A pair of shoes stopped in his field of view: glossy black, Starfleet issue, tidy and well shined despite signs of prolonged wear. He followed the shoes up past gray dress uniform trousers to the sight of Spock looking down at him like a particularly curious specimen.

They regarded each other for a moment, before the Vulcan spoke, “He is asleep.”

McCoy nodded, head swimming as he did so.

“Am I correct in surmising that you have not been outside since transferring down?”

The doctor opened his mouth to reply, then closed it again when he realised he had absolutely nothing to say. He squawked in surprise when a hand grasped him by the upper arm and hauled upwards, bringing him to his feet almost effortlessly. Once he was upright, the grip didn’t ease and he found himself being propelled down the hallway towards the lifts. When the lift doors opened he finally found his voice to protest, “Spock, what the hell are you doing?”

The grip on his arm only tightened in response, pulling him into the cab and triggering a request for the ground floor. When the lift doors opened McCoy was confronted by sunlight streaming through the large lobby windows. Spock strode forwards, pulling the doctor along beside him.

As they approached the doors, McCoy felt a spark of fear ignite in his chest. Despite knowing it was irrational, he began to struggle, not even caring that he was making a scene in the middle of Starfleet Medical. Softly, yet in a tone that brooked no disagreement, Spock said, “Do not try to fight me, Doctor.”

McCoy was sure his boots actually scraped over the threshold of the building, rather than walking under his own power. The sunlight hit him full in the face and he closed his eyes in pain, aware he was still being dragged forward into the outdoor plaza. His senses were overwhelmed: after a hermetically sealed ship and then two weeks in the temperature controlled sterile air of the medical center the light breeze of an autumn day, carrying the scent of eucalyptus, cedar, and a faint overtone of dust and smoke was overpowering.

Finally, the forward motion stopped and the hand forced him down instead. Managing to blink his eyes open, McCoy found them seated side-by-side on a bench facing a small fountain. The fear in his chest twisted, hard, making sweat stand out on his brow and his hands tremble.

Spock’s hand shifted from the doctor’s upper arm to the back of the other man’s neck, pressing firmly in a spot that made a spark shoot down McCoy’s spine and the fear… vanish.

“What’the?” McCoy found himself suddenly able to breathe again; the emotion receding. “What the hell was that?”

Spock’s careful gaze flitted over the doctor as he explained, “A mild form of neuropressure, Doctor, nothing untoward.”

McCoy’s overloaded senses quieted: the breeze became a gentle ruffling of his hair, the sunlight pleasantly warming his face and he sighed in appreciation. He felt exhausted. He finally felt _good_. 

They sat in silence for some time, several minutes, or more, before Spock shifted and removed a temporary pass card from his pocket. “You have been assigned quarters in the Presidio.”

“Spock, I…”

The Vulcan cut him off before he could protest, “I asked Doctor M’Benga to monitor the captain, and contact us if there is any change to his status. You said yourself that Jim is unlikely to wake until tomorrow: in the meantime you need to rest _away_ from the medical center. I’m sure your family would appreciate hearing from you as well, as would the bridge crew...”

How Spock knew he hadn’t contacted anyone in the last two weeks was beyond him. Other considerations immediately became apparent: the ship had taken heavy damage; did he even have any possessions? He’d left a small locker of things somewhere on Earth, but couldn’t even remember what it contained. “Is Enterprise…”

“The crew have been put on extended leave and the ship has been towed to the orbital shipyards for damage assessment.”

Great. All his things were stranded.

As if able to read his thoughts, Spock continued, “Your cabin was largely undamaged. I took the liberty of moving your belongings to your temporary housing.”

Groaning internally, he grumbled aload, “I pity the ensign who had to do that.”

Spock’s brows drew together, as if surprised by the thought. “On the contrary, doctor, I undertook that myself.”

Oh. He risked a sideways glance at the Vulcan and found impassive brown eyes regarding him. “Well, uh, thanks, Spock.” He turned the pass card over in his hands, knowing argument wouldn’t be fruitful. 

“Am I correct to assume the captain will be alert for longer tomorrow?”

The non sequitur caught him off guard, and he had to consider for a moment before he answered, “I think so, but it’s hard to say. He’s going to be very weak. For a long time.” He’s going to _hate_ it, went unsaid.

“We will have to be prepared for questions about his fitness to return to command.”

Anger shot hotly through the doctor, “Dammit, Spock, he just woke up!”

“I am not questioning, doctor, but wanted to warn you that others will.”

His anger deflated at that. “You’re right, of course.” Spock wouldn’t have asked if it wasn’t important. Someone must have asked already. “Who’s been wondering?”

“I have repeatedly been called to give evidence, as has the rest of the bridge crew. Admiral Barnett has managed to prevent them from approaching you while you are serving as Jim’s primary caregiver.” 

McCoy scrubbed a hand over his face because _of course_ there was an inquest. 

Spock observed the gesture, then continued, “Admiral Marcus’ betrayal has caused considerable shock. Admirals Chandra and Lui are chairing the inquest,” which was good news, because both had been friends of Pike and appreciated Jim as well.

Another thought made McCoy’s stomach sink: Jim had been too out of it that morning to ask many questions, but that was unlikely to last. “Spock…” He had to clear his throat to continue, “He’s going to ask about Enterprise; he has no idea about San Francisco.”

The Vulcan realised the doctor had been too focused on his patient to know either so he supplied, “Twenty-two died on Enterprise, I have contacted their families in my capacity as first officer, the current death toll for San Francisco is estimated at fifteen thousand two-hundred.”

The words hit McCoy like a punch to the gut. “He’s going to think he failed.”

Spock raised an eyebrow, “And yet he is being hailed as a hero: Enterprise did not fall, and Khan was unable to effectively target the city. Countless lives were saved.”

McCoy felt old all over again, and bone-weary. It was more than he could deal with today; for now, he needed to simply focus on the fact that Jim had survived. “I guess I’ll follow your orders and go get some rest.” 

No order had been involved, but the Vulcan didn’t correct him, merely standing with the other man and offering, “I will see you tomorrow, Doctor.” 

**********

There was a smell of dust and smoke as he travelled across the ruined city, skirting the exclusion zone around the wreck of the Vengeance. Work crews were on site: towing debris away and searching for survivors who had managed to hang on in sublevels of the destroyed buildings. Alighting in the Presidio, McCoy was grateful for a breeze from the ocean that brought with it clean, crisp air. The assigned quarters were on a hill overlooking the bridge and the lift responded to his key card by taking him to a surprisingly high floor in the complex. The door was unassuming, and McCoy took a moment to switch the lock from the passkey to his thumbprint before opening it with a grumbled, “Let’s see what Vulcan decorating looks like.”

The view took his breath away: floor to ceiling windows overlooking the ocean. He stepped inside, frowning in surprise. A bright, well stocked kitchen open to a dining area and large open plan living room. There was a stack of Starfleet totes on the coffee table, a small item carefully placed on top. McCoy recognised it immediately; how Spock had guessed its importance was beyond him.

He vividly remembered being called into Pike’s office, after the Nero affair and Jim’s commendation. The older man had scrutinized him in a way McCoy couldn’t quite read as he indicated two padds on his desk. A quite literal fork in the road. The first: a post at Starfleet Medical as a surgery lead with a research chair and a surprisingly large team. Safely on the ground in San Francisco; perhaps even able to have Joanna visit from time to time. Respectable, with opportunities for advancement. The second, signed off by James Tiberius Kirk: CMO of the Enterprise on a mission of deep space exploration. Pestilence and disease and unknown danger. Deep space and shuttles and transporters and everything else that made his stomach tie itself in knots.

The admiral watched him skim the two for a moment, then cleared his throat. McCoy glanced up and there was something dancing in Pike’s blue eyes that he couldn’t understand. Sliding open a drawer, the admiral pulled out a slim parcel, setting it on the desk next to the padd from Jim. “It came with this.”

Frowning in confusion, McCoy opened the small cloth drawstring bag and pulled out a slim book. A _real_ book: vintage paper and a faint smell of dust. The cover was a pale blue, medical blue, and bare except for a curling embossed text: _Spring and All by William Carlos Williams_. He flipped open the pages and read the first lines that caught his eye: 

_By the road to the contagious hospital_  
_under the surge of the blue_  
_mottled clouds driven from the_  
_northeast—a cold wind._

He’d felt something, then, something he hadn’t felt in a long time. Perhaps never before. He had to swallow hard before he could look up and meet Pike’s gaze. “Enterprise.” He couldn’t believe what he was saying, but it felt so right at the same time. “I want Enterprise.”

The corner of Pike’s mouth had quirked up in a half smile at that, tone even as he simply said, “As you wish, son.” 

Returning to the present, McCoy ran a reverent finger over the cover of the book, murmuring to himself, “So much depends upon a red wheel barrow glazed with rain water beside the white chickens.” He had a sudden urge to call Joanna. He had a sudden desire to see Jim.

Setting that aside, he moved to stand in front of the floor to ceiling windows, appreciating the view of the ocean. No hint of the city; of the Vengeance. The apartment undoubtedly belonged to Starfleet, but this didn’t feel like standard quarters. Turning, he regarded the large space and found three doors besides the entrance. The first was, as he guessed, a guest bathroom. The second revealed an office which connected to a bedroom and en suite; his favorite leather jacket neatly set out on the bed. 

Curious, he walked back through the apartment and tried the door on the opposite side of the living room. It opened to reveal another, even larger, bedroom. The room was in the corner of the building, and the views swept from the bridge around to the ocean. There was a large bed as well as a comfortable looking seating area, with a door that could only be an en suite. The wall was dominated by a bookcase, familiar leather bound volumes and alien trinkets neatly arranged on the shelves. There were several Starfleet totes stacked in the sitting area… and a jacket that he recognized as Jim’s on the bed.

“Hell, Spock.” McCoy’s legs suddenly felt funny so he sat on the bed, hand reaching out to smooth the worn leather as he growled, “You pointy-eared, _wonderful_ , bastard.”


	3. Fraternal Bonds

The wooden grain of the podium seemed to glow, dully, in the light, even as the faces seated at the tribunal were indistinct. Jim knew who should be there: Komack, Barnett, Chandra, Lui… but he couldn’t quite _see_ them. It was as if the fog from the bay had rolled straight into the room as well. The crowd was murmuring behind him; Bones was there somewhere, but could only feel a growing dread. This isn’t _right_ he realised, somehow, even as his heart rate accelerated and full blown panic began to crawl its way up his throat. Anaphylaxis: throttling him even as he tried to breathe. He’d experienced it once before; a heat and pressure in the back of his throat, growing, unstoppable… a lucid realization of what was happening and just enough time to be afraid before everything started to fade out. 

Spock’s voice, impossibly loud: “The purpose is to experience fear. Fear in the face of certain death. To accept that fear and to maintain control of oneself and one’s crew.”

The world shifted and he was looking through containment glass, searing pain as his organs liquified in the radiation. There was no one on the other side. The pain grew until he felt like he was on fire; thought he could see the flames and smell ash as his skin began to stretch and burst. A heavy force pressed down on him, as if the gravity had been turned up too high. Someone, far away, was screaming.

Jim woke with a loud gasp and a wailing of vital monitors, Spock’s words from his dream still echoing even as he opened his eyes.

“Easy,” McCoy’s hand pressed reassuringly on the other man’s shoulder as he repeated, “easy, Jim.” Abandoning scanners in favor of old fashioned touch, the doctor slid his hand up to cup the side of the captain’s face, “Look at me. Look at me and breathe.”

The room was too bright; all Jim could see was white light so intense he thought he’d gone blind. The scent of ash seemed to linger, even as it gained an overtone of antiseptic and the insipid flatness of scrubbed air. Blue eyes flickered wildly for a moment, then settled on the doctor’s face and seemed to focus as he gasped, “Bones?”

Biting back his worry, the doctor forced himself to smile as he said, “In the flesh.”

Still panting as if there wasn’t enough oxygen in the room, Jim blurted out the first words that came to his racing mind, “You look like shit, Bones.” It was an unwelcome truth: the doctor’s skin had a slightly greyish cast that typically came from stress and exhaustion. The man looked like he’d been put through the wringer and was still in need of sleeping the clock around.

McCoy snorted, “Yeah, well, you’re one to talk. And it’s your fault anyway.” He slowly pulled back, running his hand down onto the other man’s shoulder, anchoring him to the present as he continued to coax, “Take a few breaths, slowly, that’s it.” He did have a bedside manner, no matter what Jim tended to accuse him of.

The frown lines on Jim’s forehead slowly eased, along with the pulse that had been racing when he woke up. “What…”

McCoy shushed him even as he cast a doctor’s gaze over the still trembling features, “It was just a dream, Jim. You’re okay.”

“Nightmare.” Jim huffed another breath, dragging the air through his teeth as he said, softly, “I understand now.”

Suppressing an urge to grab a med scanner and check for neurological damage, the doctor forced himself to stay still and ask, “What?”

There was a brightness in the blue eyes that warned of emotion just held in check. “The Kobayashi Maru.”

Uncertain how to comfort his friend, McCoy gave Jim’s shoulder what he hoped was a reassuring squeeze, turning in surprise as the door flew open and Spock entered the room at a pace closer to a run than a walk.

Spock’s gaze flitted up and down as he approached the bed, scanning the other man from head to toe as if looking for an injury. Why? Nothing had happened since the day before. Jim’s right hand lifted slightly from the blanket and Spock didn’t hesitate in grasping it without a word, even as McCoy’s eyebrow just about hit his hairline at the gesture. 

There was an intensity in the Vulcan’s eyes that the doctor had only seen twice before: once after his homeworld was destroyed, and then again two weeks before. Spock changed his grip in order to sweep his thumb smoothly over the back of the other man’s hand as he said, “It is all right, Jim.”

And with that Jim took a shaky breath and seemed to become immediately more grounded; the small trembles that had been shaking his frame ceased. Flashing a half-smile that didn’t quite reach his eyes, he said, “Sorry to give you a scare, Bones.” And that was utter bullshit because Jim only used that smile when he had something to hide.

Ignoring the fact that the captain had clearly given _himself_ a scare, McCoy released his hold on the other man’s shoulder. “No harm done. Always good to have a benign way to check my monitors. Lord knows I don’t get enough of them.” It didn’t escape his notice that it took Spock a few seconds longer to release the captain’s hand.

As Spock took a careful half step backwards, Jim’s gaze flicked around the room; clearly taking in more of it than the day before. “We’re Earthside?” The blinds were lowered to just a few feet off the floor, but an impression of sunlight and trees made it through nonetheless.

McCoy nodded and waved an arm expansively, “Finest suite Starfleet Medical has to offer.”

The captain snorted, then his smile faded as he shifted slightly on the bed, paused, then shifted again. He looked between them, then softly said, “I can’t move, Bones. I can direct my head and wiggle a little, but that’s it. I don’t think I can even raise my voice; I feel so tired.”

Wishing he didn’t have to offer a prognosis, McCoy forced himself to bring a veneer of professional detachment as he explained, “The radiation did a number on you, but the regenerative effects of the serum also caused massive systemic reactions. Coupled with further muscle wasting while you were unconscious you’re going to be extremely weak and it’s going to take considerable time to build up your strength. Your stomach lining is likely to be extremely sensitive, and you may have picked up some new allergies to boot.” Wrinkling his nose in sympathy, the doctor offered, “Your, uh, bowels aren’t going to be much fun at first either.”

A flush of embarrassment appeared on Jim’s face and he closed his eyes for a moment before asking, “How long?”

“A while.” McCoy cleared his throat and admitted, “We may not know for sure until we try, but it will be six months at least, maybe a year for full strength.” Perhaps longer, went unsaid. He really didn’t know this time.

“Will…” Jim’s gaze slipped down to the expanse of white blanket and the next words followed softly, “Will I be fit for command?”

Injecting a confidence he wasn’t sure he felt, McCoy forced himself to smile, “You’re damn right you will.” Jabbing an index finger, he qualified, “Provided you stick to my program, of course.”

Jim rolled his eyes, “Of course.” Another thought seemed to occur to him and he looked to Spock instead, “But what about Enterprise? The ship can’t wait for me to…”

Spock cut off the other man, “Negative, Captain. The Enterprise is currently in orbital spacedock for repairs, and Admiral Komack has just approved a series of retrofits and improvements that could take up to a year to complete. They are insistent Enterprise be re-launched as the flagship, and you will be recovered in time.”

A year? That was either serious damage, or serious refits. Perhaps both. He remembered the ship dropping into the atmosphere; a collision course for the bay area and countless people on the ground. Screaming and yelling; he remembered that too. The grav plating and inertial dampeners offline and people tumbling with a scent of acrid smoke. Spock’s soft words through the containment glass: “You saved the crew.” Jim felt his stomach twist and a prickle of sweat stood out on the back of his neck. 

Suddenly nauseous, Jim licked his lips, then forced out the question, “How many?”

Bones’ eyes flickered towards Spock, but the Vulcan answered, quickly, “Twenty-one crewmembers lost their lives. I have contacted their families to express my condolences, and highlight their bravery. I am sorry, captain.”

Jim remembered his own angry words to Pike: “You know how many crew members I’ve lost since I took command? Not one. Not _one_!”

And Pike’s in return: “You don’t respect the chair. You know why? Because you’re not ready for it.”

The sunlight through the blinds was too bright, and for once Jim wished the San Francisco weather was greyer to suit his mood. Vulcans do not lie, he remembered, but that left a possibility: “You’re not telling me something.” Bones gave that twitch again and he just _knew_. Something else had happened. Something bad. Chekov, when he went to throw the manual override? That alone was unthinkable, but if not that…

Spock shifted to clasp his hands behind his back as he reported, “Khan attempted a final act against Starfleet, by setting a collision course for Headquarters.”

“What?” If he could move he’d have sat up, but as it was Jim’s upper body simply jerked against the cushions supporting him, damaged muscles cramping painfully. “He _tried_ to ram the city?”

“The Vengeance was heavily damaged and unmaneuverable. He was not able to attain his objective. The ship crashed in the bay, hitting Alcatraz before ploughing through the water and then sliding into buildings along the waterfront.”

That had to be an understatement. Christ there were _skyscrapers_ along the waterfront. He pictured the steel and glass towers in that area and felt his throat tighten so much it was hard to ask, “How many on the ground?”

“Casualty estimates are currently fifteen thousand.”

Fifteen _thousand_. Jim suddenly couldn’t breathe at all.

McCoy gripped his patient’s upper arm, voice an urgent undertone as he tried to cut through the suddenly shuttered affect. “You saved the crew on Enterprise, Jim; you saved everyone on the ground who we would have hit; you prevented all out war with the Klingons; and even that bastard didn’t get the crash he wanted…”

“Bones, stop.” Jim tossed his head towards the blinds, not meeting their eyes, “Just stop.” He remembered Pike’s words from the night they had met: “Your father was Captain of a starship for twelve minutes. He saved eight hundred lives, including your mother’s. And yours. I dare you to do better.”

The doctor stopped speaking, and when, after several long seconds, Jim made no move to look back towards them he reluctantly released his grip as well. The captain’s face and neck had flushed a blotchy red and a little vein on his forehead stood out in sharp relief. McCoy exchanged a sideways glance with Spock, both unsure what to do.

Eventually, the doctor tried again, “Jim…”

“Just go.” Kirk’s face was resolutely turned away from them, the mumbled words more defeated than angry. “Please. Both of you.”

In the reflection from the window, they could see the captain close his eyes. Effectively, they were dismissed.

**********

McCoy curled his hands around a cup of coffee and told himself he wasn’t allowed to feel hurt. That Jim needed time to process what he’d been told. Time alone, unfortunately. The padd next to his elbow was silent; the remote readings suggesting Jim was still awake, but only barely.

It was well after breakfast but still a while before lunch and the canteen was correspondingly quiet. Spock sank into the seat across from the doctor, carefully setting a cup on the table. After a sip of his tea, he said, “Nyota informed me that she has not yet heard from you.”

There was no accusation behind the words, simply a statement of fact, yet McCoy felt judged nonetheless. The first name, though, that was Spock’s way of bringing out the big guns. Splaying his fingers on the table, the doctor recounted the previous day after they had parted, “I went to the apartment, like you said. I…” What he wanted to say was jumbled, so he settled for, “Thank you.” He took a shaky breath and forced himself to explain, “I hadn’t realized how exhausted I was and that apartment…” It was hard to put it into words, but he tried nonetheless, “I guess it gave me hope.” Rubbing the short hair at the nape of his own neck, he admitted, “I fell asleep without contacting anyone.”

There was more to it than that, of course, but Spock seemed content to let it drop in favor of glancing pointedly at the padd.

With a huff, McCoy picked up the device and tapped out a short message to the bridge crew, angling the screen to show the Vulcan: _It caused significant complications, but the serum was effective and the captain has briefly regained consciousness. He is extremely weak and still suffering from the effects of the transfusion so not yet ready for visitors. I will monitor his condition closely over the next day or two, and alert you as soon as he can manage company. If you would like me to pass on a message just drop me a note._

He only managed three sips of coffee under Spock’s scrutiny before the padd started vibrating with message notifications: Uhura, Sulu, Scotty, Chekov… God, he felt like a jerk.

Spock’s own padd gave a chime and McCoy looked up from his musings. Uhura? No. The Vulcan slid his chair back. “Admiral Barnett has requested my presence.” He looked ready to say something else, but suddenly stiffened just as McCoy’s padd lit up: the remote monitoring system flashing amber.

Glancing down, McCoy cursed and said, “Accelerated heart rate. Looks like another nightmare. I’d better...”

They both stood, regarding each other across the table. Spock appeared torn; if it was possible for a Vulcan to look that way. The message from the admiral was still displayed on the front of the padd, forcing him back to duty. “I will see to the admiral’s request and return later.”

With a curt nod, McCoy abandoned his coffee and hurried back upstairs. He could hear Jim before he opened the door to the room-- too weak to scream loudly, but clearly trying nonetheless.

The captain’s head was thrashing from side to side, garbled words interspersed with what sounded like noises of pain. For a man normally so in control it was a shocking contrast. Heart and stress monitors were through the roof, beeping alarms that McCoy quickly silenced before taking the man by the shoulders. “Jim! Wake up, dammit!” A small shake didn’t seem to have an effect so he tried harder, shaking more firmly as he said, “Wake up!”

Another gasping return to consciousness, confused blue eyes taking a moment to focus on the doctor. “Bones?” Jim’s face crumpled slightly as he realized what had happened. “God, Bones, it _hurts_.” He took another whooping breath, “How can it hurt so much?”

Unable to tell if the pain was real or not, the doctor loaded a hypo with an analgesic and pressed it to the other man’s neck, muttering an apology under his breath as Jim winced at the bite of the injector. 

The heart and stress ratings slid back down to acceptable levels, but the frown on Jim’s face remained. When the doctor finally put down his hand scanners, he asked, “Can you make me sleep without dreaming?” There were, of course, drugs that could do that, but none of them were strictly recommended. Sensing the likelihood of protest, he continued, “Please, Bones. Just for today. I know I’ve been out for two weeks, but I’m exhausted and I keep dreaming...” 

“Did it hurt?” And McCoy could just about kick himself as soon as the words are out of his mouth. Of course it fucking hurt. He was about to tell the other man to just forget it, when Jim nodded.

Softly, he admitted, “Right through me.” Jim clenched and unclenched his hands, as if remembering, “I’d managed to ignore it while I was climbing, or maybe it was the adrenaline, but after I got down... I could feel myself getting weaker. I knew I wasn’t going to make it. Spock helped, though.” Jim’s gaze became hooded. “In the nightmares I feel like I’m on fire. It’s not right, but it feels so real.”

Against his better judgement, McCoy requisitioned the drug and tried to ignore the relief in Jim’s eyes when he administered the medication. As he waited for the other man to fall asleep, he thought back to the canteen and frowned. He’d swear Spock had flinched _before_ the monitors on the padd had been triggered. And the Vulcan had shown an almost uncanny ability to show up at the right time over the last few days. It was strange, to say the least.

Smoothing the blanket around the curve of Jim’s collarbone, McCoy bit the inside of his cheek as he considered what to do next. There was really only one course of action that he could think of: snooping, and damned if he didn’t normally pride himself in not being a snoop. Ignoring the feeling in the pit of his stomach at what he was about to do, the doctor retreated to his office and queried the central computer for Enterprise’s security footage. Sure enough, the usual weeklong loop was being preserved for the inquest. Wishing he had a glass of whiskey at hand, McCoy started the footage. 

It was so much worse than he’d imagined. Jim: hurting, _scared_ , unable to actually have the comfort of touch, pressing a hand against double-layered containment glass; Spock forming a wish of peace and long-life against his side of the glass, Jim sluggishly moving his fingers to return the gesture, then dying without another word.

Without another _goddamn_ word.

McCoy flinched in his seat at the Vulcan’s guttural cry, even as he wondered at the visible tear-track on the normally controlled face. Backing up the video slightly and pausing, he narrowed his eyes at the hands aligned on the glass.

Footsteps in the hallway startled him out of his thoughts. Footsteps, _plural_ not another doctor or a nurse on rounds. Shutting down the footage, he entered the hallway just in time to see Jim’s door click shut. What the hell? The worst immediately came to mind: Section 31 agents with a grudge; or angry, grief-stricken family members. By the time he actually reached Jim’s door he was convinced he’d be having to summon ‘fleet security to back him up. Instead, he was confronted by Uhura and Scotty standing against the back wall of the room like guilty schoolchildren. 

Uhura held her hands up, placatingly and whispered, “I’m sorry, Len, but we had to see him. We didn’t get close or make any noise.”

Scotty seemed to be gulping air in an effort to keep from erupting into one of his spectacular displays of emotion, but didn’t even bother to tear his gaze away from Kirk to make eye contact with the doctor. 

The raw emotion in the video was still fresh in McCoy’s mind and instead of chewing them out he said, gruffly, “I had to sedate him a little while ago. You couldn’t wake him if you tried.” Scotty’s adam’s apple bobbed alarmingly at that and Uhura’s eyes glistened in a way that made him feel like even more of an asshole for not making time for them. “Oh, go hold his hand.” He’d meant the comment for Uhura, but the engineer hurried over as well. Well, hell, he thought to himself, why not? 

Uhura gently rubbed her thumb over the back of the captain’s hand in a way that reminded him of Spock, earlier, which was too bizarre to dwell on. 

Fortunately, she offered a distraction by softly asking, “He’s really okay?”

Truncating his previous explanation, McCoy sighed and offered, “He’s alive and stable; and was talking with us well enough earlier. I wasn’t exaggerating, though, we almost lost him all over again a few times. His body’s pretty wiped out and it’s going to take a while to get his strength back. Not to mention I don’t know what kind of complications to look out for.” When he put it like that, it was no wonder Jim teased him for being a pessimist. Forcing the bright side on things, he continued, “But the latest word is Enterprise is going to have a year of refits, so we’ve got plenty of time to get him back on form.”

Scotty hadn’t even looked up; McCoy wasn’t sure if the other man had heard him at all, but Uhura nodded, then continued her gentle stroking. Feeling superfluous, he gave the monitors one last check then retreated to his office.

**********

McCoy remained resolutely in his office until he heard their footsteps leave Jim’s room, and even then spent the two and a half seconds it took them to pass his office door scowling deeply at a padd. Bullshit, of course, nothing had changed in Jim’s readings, but he just wasn’t up to keeping his mask of _doctor_ firmly in place and offering reassurances. Jim was going to be fine, he believed that now, but at some point McCoy would need his own space to come to terms with the past two weeks. 

The screen he’d left running on his desk switched to a news broadcast and an aerial shot of the waterfront caught his eye. The hulk of Vengeance was rapidly being broken down and carried away, robots swarming it like leaf cutter ants. Two more weeks, the broadcast said, and they expected to lift the last of the saucer section and tow it out over the Pacific and then into orbit. It looked like they were trying to get the damn thing lifted largely intact.

The footage changed and Pike’s service photo appeared in the top left corner of the screen, inset over pre-recorded video of a small group of people in the Starfleet memorial park, standing at attention as a plaque was unveiled on the wall reserved for the admiralty. Shit, Bones thought, the images hitting him like a punch to the gut followed by a flash of anger, even as a scrolling ticker of the admiral’s many commendations appeared at the bottom of the screen. Of course they’d be holding memorials, but damned if the person who most needed to be present was there. 

He squinted at the screen, recognising several surviving captains and other members of command. The footage continued for just a few seconds longer, before cutting to another feature providing updates on the casualty counts for San Francisco and instructions for accessing the missing and survivor’s database and that was bleak enough that McCoy stabbed the button to terminate the connection. He sat, numbly, for a long minute; eye twitching towards the lower cabinet that in his office on Enterprise would contain a bottle of bourbon, but here was full of spare equipment.

The urge to head over to a hole-in-the-wall in the Mission was strong, no matter that it was barely the afternoon, but he quashed it with the thought that meant actually leaving the medical center. Pulling up a half-written article on Orion pneumonia for the SMJ he pecked away at adding another paragraph or two until he couldn’t stand it anymore and found himself walking to Jim’s room, even though he knew the man was going to sleep for another six hours _at least_. 

Jim was, of course, exactly where McCoy had left him: deep in a drugged sleep, but seeming to breathe more deeply than he had the day before. It was a good sign, the doctor reminded himself, that the epithelial cells seemed to be continuing to regenerate well; he hoped it meant the same for Jim’s GI tract or the coming weeks were going to be hell. 

Settling into a chair by the head of the bed, he found it suddenly easier to get immersed in his writing; only surfacing several pages, and several hours, later when the door opened and Spock slipped into the room.

The Vulcan appeared slightly unsettled, glancing at the medical readouts before looking to McCoy and asking, “The captain is merely sleeping?”

“Like a baby,” McCoy confirmed, setting down his padd and standing. “I gave him a sedative with a cholinergic regulator.” He busied himself by waving a hand scanner over the captain, adding, “He’s been having nightmares. Vivid ones; never seen anything like it with him before. It’s enough to wonder if it’s a side effect of having his neural pathways rebuilt after all the radiation.” McCoy risked a glance at the Vulcan out of the corner of his eye and hazarded, “And I think you know something about it.”

The silence extended, then Spock said, softly, “I am with Nyota.”

There was an implied word there that McCoy filled in after several long seconds, “But?”

Spock’s eyes closed, unable to meet the doctor’s as he admitted, “But I can sense the captain.”

McCoy’s stomach flipped like he was in a shuttle and the gravity had gone offline. “Whadd’ya mean, sense?” The words were accusatory, but there was more surprise than heat behind them. “You’re in his god-damned _head_?”

“Nothing quite so direct, Doctor.” Spock glanced at Jim’s right hand, sitting on top of the blanket, then clasped his own hands firmly behind his back. There was none of his usual confidence underlying the gesture, instead, it was as if he was working to keep himself under control.

This didn’t make a damned bit of sense to the doctor, but then again little about Vulcans did. Remembering Spock’s behavior over the previous days, he asked, “But you could tell when he was waking up?” And the startle that morning, “When he was having a nightmare?”

“Indeed.” And damned if the tips of Spock’s ears didn’t flush the faintest of green as he swallowed, and added, “The nightmares may be partially my fault. Emotional transference can be an unfortunate side effect.” 

And this made McCoy’s stomach clench because understanding side effects was supposed to be the doctor’s territory, “Side effect of what?”

“A mind-meld…” Spock tipped his chin slightly to one side, not quite meeting McCoy’s eyes as he added, “A bond.”

A _bond_? Knowing he sounded like a scalded cat, McCoy couldn’t help spluttering and finally in a voice about an octave and a half too high, squawked: “You mean like some Vulcan _mating_ thing?”

Spock’s flush deepened at that, his normally porcelain complexion turning distinctly green. 

Holy shit, thought McCoy. Now he really wished that bottle of bourbon was in the next room, because _this_ was the last thing he’d expected. Emotions were running through him faster than he could keep track of: surprise, anger, and something suspiciously unmentionable before he tamped it firmly down. 

“I have sought advice from the elders on New Vulcan.” Spock glanced down at Jim, then back up to the doctor, apparently tongue-tied as he tried to decide where to start. “I apologize, doctor, but Vulcans… do not speak of these matters easily.”

And with that, the anger left him and McCoy sagged slightly at the prospect of another unwelcome complication. Damned if the universe wasn’t laughing its ass off at him. “Vulcans don’t speak of anything easily, Spock.” He indicated the spare chair across the room and dropped back into his own. “Pull up a chair and tell me about it.” It took a few seconds for the chair to be dragged over, during which he ran a quick scan to confirm that Jim was, in fact, still sleeping soundly.

Rigidly, as if he would have preferred to stand, Spock stared at a point slightly above McCoy’s right eyebrow and began to explain, “The elders had never heard of such a case before, however, one recalled that deep in our history there was a form of bonding practiced within families, such as between a parent and a child. It is a tradition that has been extinct for millennia, however, may be the closest case to what has occurred. There are also references in some of the ancient texts to fraternal relationships among non-blood relatives. When pressed, the elder concluded that while the ancient Vulcan dialect renders a lot unclear, it is not unlikely that among the warrior caste a form of bond would be formed between friend-pairs, independent of any traditional family structure to which they belonged.”

“Are these…” McCoy thought back to what he’d heard about ancient Greece, “Friends you sleep with, or…”

Spock cut him off quickly, affronted gaze finally meeting the doctor’s eyes, “I have no desire for intimate relations with Captain Kirk.”

And that was just bizarre enough to inject a humor into the proceedings that made McCoy snort, “Well thank heavens for that.” Finding Spock staring at him, searchingly, he waved a hand, “Sorry, continue. A fraternal bond? How?”

“In engineering, when Jim was… dying… we shared a moment of conversation. As we touched the glass together, I inadvertently reached out in a manner I had not previously been aware was possible.” Recalling his conversation with the elders, he qualified, “May not even be possible, except under particularly extenuating circumstances.” 

McCoy was trying to understand this, he really was, as he raised an eyebrow and prompted, “So you reached out, and?”

“We connected.” Spock bowed his head, “And then he died. I experienced a strong emotional reaction at the time, but it was only in the past several days that I became aware of his presence.”

“This awareness…” McCoy didn’t even know how to frame the question.

“With some effort, and meditation, I will be able to diminish the link.” 

A _link_ , he didn’t know if he liked the sound of that any better than bond. “So you won’t be able to read his thoughts or anything?”

“I cannot ‘read his thoughts’ now, doctor. It is more a clear sense of his emotion, which also conveys a level of alertness.”

“So you could sense those nightmares. And when I have him the sedative and cholinergic regulator…”

“There was a,” Spock struggled to put it into words, “perceptible drop in his presence.” 

McCoy chewed the inside of his cheek for a moment, then asked, “You said diminish the link, not break it?”

“The elders were unsure. If it does not break, it can be rendered almost entirely imperceptible, except perhaps for moments of exceptional pain, anger, or joy. Not a true connection, but…” Reverting to Earth slang, he offered, “a sixth-sense. And a very weak one at that.” There was a slight puckering around the edges of Spock’s mouth, the Vulcan equivalent of a frown. “It will not affect my ability to bond fully with another. Nyota… I think she will understand.”

Because of course Uhura was mixed up in all of this too. She’d always struck the doctor as an understanding woman, but Jesus. “What about Jim?”

“I had not intended to tell him.”

McCoy could feel his eyebrow heading north again, but somehow managed to keep his tone even as he said, “Well that’s a hell of a thing to cover up, Spock.”

“My intent was to sever the connection, or at least fully diminish it, before he was fully cognizant of his surroundings.

Intuitively, McCoy took a guess, “But these nightmares…”

“Indeed. As you note: they seem atypical for the captain.”

Softly, McCoy said, “You can call him Jim, you know.”

Spock’s eyebrows pulled together in confusion. “I do call him ‘Jim’.”

“Yeah, sometimes, but humans usually call their close friends by their first names _all_ the time.”

“He is my friend. And he is the captain. The dichotomy need not be resolved.”

Sensing they were further off track than he’d intended, McCoy waved a hand to move them along. “The nightmares. They’re somehow a side effect of all this?”

“A fresh bond is… raw. Forming a connection requires barriers to be dropped, leaving emotions relatively unfettered until the mind’s natural control can be rebuilt. Additionally, he may have experienced a transference of my emotion.” Something flickered in the dark eyes. “Which would have been... strong… for a human to experience.”

Whistling softly through his teeth, McCoy cast an appraising eye at Jim’s slack features. No wonder the nightmares had been almost uncontrollable. “I can’t keep dosing him with this stuff forever, Spock. It’s not recommended for more than a night or two, and in his current state I hesitate to dose him with anything he doesn’t strictly need. That damned serum…”

“That ‘damned serum’ saved his life, doctor.” Steepling his fingers, Spock met the other man’s eyes. “After consulting with the elders I believe I can use a mind-meld to help Jim regain his normal mental control, after which I will close the bond. It will require several hours of meditative preparation, but I am confident it can be done.”

Vulcan brain mumbo-jumbo; Leonard McCoy didn’t like it one bit. But... He groaned, internally. _But_ , the memory of Jim that morning when he’d used his goddamn lying half-smile to try and hide the fact that he was barely maintaining control. And the knowledge of the experience he was reliving on emotional overdrive. _And_ the downright plaintive request to sleep without dreaming. Coming to a decision, the doctor stood and loaded a hypo, administering it to the side of the captain’s neck with more than his usual gentleness. Dropping the spent device onto the counter, he scrubbed a hand through his hair and fixed Spock with a stern gaze. “He’ll sleep through to tomorrow morning. You can explain it to him then.” 

And then fix this and break down the damn bond, he added, with a furrowing of his brow.

The silent message seemed to be received, as Spock nodded, then took his leave without another word.


	4. The Holy Grail

The chiming of an alarm broke into McCoy’s dreamless sleep and he was halfway sitting-up before he realized it was the clock rather than a med bay monitor. Collapsing back into the bed with a groan, thumping heart slowing to normal, the doctor stretched and felt his joints pop one by one as confusion slowly rolled back. He was Earthside. In bed. And Jim was alive.

Jim was alive.

He allowed a small smile at that, despite the fact it felt entirely too early for his alarm to be chiming so insistently. Reaching out blindly, he fumbled until he managed to connect with the device on his nightstand and effectively silence it.

The rest of reality asserted itself: Jim was alive… and Spock was going to explain the whole, he flailed mentally, bond _thing_ in an hour or two. Coffee. He needed coffee to cope with that thought. 

Rolling out of bed revealed that fog had engulfed the building; a sharp change from the sunshine the previous day. The treetops he could just see out of the window appeared muted, along with his mood. Vulcan mumbo-jumbo, he grumbled, scratching at the hair low on his belly as he padded into the bathroom.

A spectacular case of bed head and dark hollows under his eyes confronted him from the mirror. Christ, McCoy, he told himself, you look like hell. A shower helped, at least. As did shaving. By the time he was sipping from a cup of coffee in the kitchen he felt halfway human again.

It was only luck that he happened to catch the message-waiting alert out of the corner of his eye. Pausing, halfway to the fridge, he turned and opened the message, then immediately wished he hadn’t from the header alone:

_From: Starfleet Command Central: Judiciary and Inquests_  
_To: McCoy, L. [CMO: USS Enterprise]_  
_Copy: Chandra, N. [Admiral]; Lui, G. [Admiral]_  
_Subject: Summons for informal testimony_  
_Read receipt: Enabled_

“God dammit!’ He growled, scrubbing a hand over his face, cursing more thoroughly when he read the content of the message. They were summoning him for testimony that morning, and he couldn’t even pretend he hadn’t seen the message in time. He could postpone, of course, invoke a right to more thorough counsel, but it had been over two weeks since the incident and the admiralty had to be in an uproar and desperate for answers. Shit: informal testimony? There was no such thing. 

They must have been monitoring Jim’s medical records and pounced the moment it was clear the doctor wasn’t strictly needed at his patient’s bedside. The summons was for 10am; he was going to miss Spock’s meeting with Jim. Truth be told, he didn’t know how he felt about that.

Pushing the thought aside, he returned to the bedroom, taking off his physician’s clothing and pulling on his Starfleet greys instead. Another glance in the bathroom mirror confirmed that despite the change to his formal uniform he still looked less than reputable. There was nothing to be done, and with the transport system still re-routed and slow he grabbed his cover and hurried towards command, hoping to grab an hour with legal counsel before entering the lion’s den.

Of course, the scrawny lieutenant they saddled him with barely looked old enough to have finished law school. McCoy took one look at the kid and marched right back out of the legal center, killing an hour on a bench outside instead. It was chilly; the grey sky matching his uniform and gusts of wind carried leaves across the small space. He ducked his chin against the bite of the wind, wishing he’d thought about outerwear before running out of the apartment: San Francisco in autumn could be surprisingly bitter. The air seemed to be clearer, at least. The scent of dust and ash finally diminished. As his nose went numb he slowly raised his chin, relishing the sensations that were only possible planetside… and only felt quite right on Earth.

McCoy regretted his earlier choice to ignore counsel once he was ushered into the room where so-called informal statements were being taken: the two convening admirals and their aides were seated on the far side of a large table, along with Admiral Raske, the head of Starfleet Medical, and a squirrely looking lieutenant who was likely from medical ethics, plus two chairs that were still empty.

There was nothing informal about it.

Mouth suddenly dry, McCoy sank into the nearby chair, feeling like he’d been called into the principal’s office.

Admiral Lui didn’t waste any time, despite the fact that they were a few minutes early. The doors had barely been closed before she fixed him with her usually severe gaze and said, “This is a closed-door session, Doctor. We appreciate you joining voluntarily and you may end the session or request a pause to confer with your counsel at any time. Should you terminate your testimony we reserve the right to reconvene more formally in the future.”

This was not good. Trying to force a smile, he could feel it coming out as a grimace instead as he said, “Understood, ma’am.”

Admiral Chandra joined in then, leaning forwards in a manner that was less friendly and more imposing, “We would appreciate your candor in this matter. A verbatim transcript will only be retained for the internal use of the inquest leads.”

McCoy nodded, jerkily. It wasn’t like he hadn’t had to give evidence before, in the aftermath of the Narada. This time, however, he realised the stakes were higher: the presence of Raske meant medical was taking an official interest. 

Scrolling through data on a padd, Lui cleared her throat and intoned for McCoy’s benefit, and the record, “Following similar interviews with Commander Spock, Lieutenant Commander Scott, Lieutenants Uhura and Sulu, Ensign Chekov, and Doctor M’Benga, we have Doctor Leonard H. McCoy, Chief Medical Officer of the Enterprise…”

Everyone. McCoy’s stomach sank. They’d already talked to everyone else and he had to damn idea what they already knew as a result. Not that he had anything he wanted to hide, but he’d never thought Raske liked him and the squirrely lieutenant was not a good sign. He tuned back in to find Lui still talking:

“... the general facts are now understood, we wish to corroborate key details and learn more about the medical treatment provided to Captain Kirk and the orbital decay that necessitated…”

The door behind McCoy opened and Lui froze. The extra chairs, McCoy wondered, suppressing the urge to turn and look until two individuals passed him on their way to the far side of the table.

“Apologies,” Admiral Archer was an unexpected surprise as he rounded the table and came into view, “I hadn’t expected you to start a few minutes early.”

Lui looked flustered, and with good reason: Archer was third generation ‘fleet and practically treated like royalty around headquarters.

A second surprise was following the admiral: a Denobulan who, if McCoy’s judgement was anything to go by, appeared to be almost impossibly old. The alien’s cranial ridges were faintly spotted and there was a gauntness of advanced age about him, but he fixed the doctor with a pair of almost impossibly bright eyes as he took a seat. Damned if the gaze didn’t seem to go right through him.

Ignoring their discomfort, Archer settled into a chair and gave them a mild smile, “Please, Gretchen, continue.” Raske was frowning, which was not a good sign. Archer caught the expression before the admiral managed to bring it under control and gave a dismissive shrug, explaining, “I was aware the testimony was bound to get a bit medical, so Phlox kindly consented to join me. His expertise will be valuable, given the circumstances.”

 _Phlox_. The Denobulan’s name still carried weight around Starfleet Medical, having served with Archer’s father on the original NX-01. McCoy hadn’t realized he was even still alive.

It was Admiral Chandra who broke the silence: clearing his throat and practically nudging Lui with his elbow. “Right,” Lui seemed to re-center herself with her padd, then continued, “the orbital decay that necessitated Captain Kirk’s entry to the reactor core without personal protective equipment, resulting in a dose of radiation in excess of 50 sieverts. Dr. McCoy, where were you during these events?”

He remembered the chaos: supplies spilling across the floor as the intertial dampeners failed. The groans of people being dragged through his doors. Pulling himself back to the present, McCoy forced himself to meet the Admiral’s eyes and respond, “I was in the med bay, running triage on injured crewmembers when the intertial dampeners went offline. I put med bay under emergency lockdown just prior to the evacuation order being given.”

“And were you called to engineering?”

“No.” God, was he going to have to repeat it for them? “Med bay was still under emergency lock down and I was trying to keep Ensign Patel from bleeding out. She took a piece of deck plating to the femoral artery. And Mr. Scott…” McCoy was still furious about this, although he knew Scotty had done the right thing. “Mr. Scott knew the medical consequences of what had occurred, and where I was needed most. It was all over very fast.”

Lui noted something on her padd, then continued, “What was Captain Kirk’s condition when you did see him?”

“He was,” McCoy swallowed and the word came out softly, “dead.”

The squirrel chose that moment to speak up: “Can you please be more precise, Doctor?” Definitely Medical Ethics, wanting nuances of cardiac death, brain death, and cellular degradation.

McCoy scowled and tried to keep himself under control as he ground out, “They brought him to med bay in a body bag. I think that’s about as clear as you need.” He could still feel the fabric underneath his fingers; the phantom touch of the catch between his thumb and forefinger.

The lieutenant looked ready to argue, but a look from Archer quelled him.

Lui consulted her padd, and continued, “Our records indicate fourteen minutes elapsed between the captain’s death from radiation exposure and transfer to the medical bay.”

He’d spent ten of those minutes completely oblivious to the fact that Jim was dead. Scotty had run a decontamination cycle, then commed the medical bay requesting a body bag and a stretcher. Distracted by finishing Patel’s surgery, he’d bit back a remark that there was going to be more than one casualty to pick up, and just to wait. Scotty must have sensed the impending response, because he’d choked out, “The captain.”

And for a blissful half second McCoy had thought, “The captain, what?” Before he realized what Scotty was really telling him was, “It’s the captain.”

He didn’t remember finishing the dermal regen on Patel. He still wasn’t sure who had done it.

Lui set down her padd in favor of watching McCoy intently “If the captain was brought into the medical bay as a corpse, at what point did you decide to begin treatment?”

McCoy remembered sinking into his desk chair, feeling like he’d been sucker punched. “I was preparing to issue the death certificate,” in truth, preparing to burst into tears, “when the tribble I’d previously injected with a platelet solution purred.” 

“You had experimented on a mammalian life form?”

“A _dead_ tribble. I thought it might slow down the cellular decay. I never expected…” In that moment, McCoy understood: they were going to try to take his medical license away. It was a god-damned set-up, right from the start. He forced himself to slow down, to anticipate the trap. “I never expected the thing could come back to life. It meant there was some hope, so I transferred Kirk into a cryotube to preserve neurological function.”

“And what was the basis of consent in this case?”

Consent? Jim had been _dead_.

The squirrel piped up again, scrolling through his own padd, “Admiral Pike was still listed as contact with durable power of attorney. A mother and brother are also listed in the captain’s personal file.”

That wasn’t uncommon: most of them tried to have someone Earthside, or at least not on the same ship, named in such a capacity. It didn’t mean every decision was expected to go there. McCoy scowled at the insinuation. “Pike was _dead_ , there wasn’t time to try to track down his family, and I’m his doctor. It was my prerogative, both as CMO and his personal physician.” And as his friend. His _best_ friend, and the damn closest thing the captain had to real family.

Raske, red faced, splayed his fingers on the table as if grounding his anger and said, too loudly, “So you just jumped into playing God!”

McCoy’s eyes widened. So that’s what this was about. At least in part...

Raske looked between Chandra and Lui, as if to gather their support, “There are thousands of corpses in that wreckage. Can you imagine what would happen if people heard Starfleet is sitting on the holy grail? That we experiment on corpses?” His hand closed into a fist, and he struck the table, “We’ll have a damned nightmare on our hands. They’re questioning everything about us right now. The scandal could tear apart what’s left of Starfleet. It would be the end of the Federation itself.”

It was Archer who responded; secure in his position and above the usual politics between the admirals, “A captain counts on his Chief Medical Officer to make decisions, hard decisions, about his health and the health of the crew. Consent is an understood aspect of that relationship.”

Admiral Chandra waved a hand, dismissively, “I hardly think _health_ is what we’re talking about here, Charles.”

It was clearly the wrong thing to do, as Archer’s face hardened and he glanced at Phlox. The admirals didn’t catch the gesture, but McCoy did, and wondered what it meant. Whether Archer had some broader understanding than he let on.

Chandra picked up the questioning: “You treated the captain with a platelet solution prepared from the augment’s blood?”

The augment: they weren’t even calling him by name. “Yes.”

Raske smiled, and it was more a baring of teeth. “How did you come to obtain a sufficient volume of blood?”

Phlox and Archer were conferring, too softly to be picked up by McCoy’s ears or the recording devices.

Wishing he knew what had been said by his crewmates in their own testimony, McCoy started, carefully, “Commander Spock had already beamed down to the surface to apprehend Khan. When we transferred Kirk into a cryotube, I told the bridge we needed to take him alive.”

“Was the plan, prior to that, to kill him?”

“Of course not, dammit!” McCoy scrubbed a hand through his hair, “The whole damn point of defying Marcus was to avoid a summary execution. To hold the admiral to account for what he’d tried to do.” Remembering the security video from outside the reactor, he wasn’t sure he wanted to comment on what Spock’s personal plan had been at that point.

“And what was the augment’s condition once apprehended?”

Knocked out, to put it mildly. Enterprise was in a low, but stable, orbit when the stretcher was guided into med bay, Spock and Uhura close behind. He’d added two further sets of restraints himself; not about to take any chances. For the record, he said, “The hand-to-hand fighting with Commander Spock had obviously been intense. Khan was unconscious prior to beam-up.”

“So you took his blood.” Raske leaned forwards, “You forcibly took his blood, created an untested serum and _experimented_ on your captain! By your own reports the reactions to the transfusion were extreme. You just about killed your patient all over again! And now we have people in cryostasis with blood that can raise the dead. What are we supposed to do, doctor? Hold them captive and bleed them for the public?”

Pushing aside memories of Jim’s face, grossly swollen; of wailing alarms and crashing vital readings, McCoy allowed himself a tight smile as he said, “I had permission.” 

Strapped to the bed, a sliver of white had appeared as Khan’s eyes opened slightly. McCoy had gripped the augment’s forearm hard enough to bruise a normal man, bending down and hissing into his ear, “Let me try to save Kirk.” The white had turned to blue as Khan’s eyes focused, then, barely able to move under the restraints, he’d twisted his arm to present the crook of his right elbow. McCoy didn’t know what he’d have done if Khan had refused. Probably taken it anyway, truth be told. Why Khan had agreed was beyond him; perhaps his augment hearing had picked up the soft hum of Kirk’s cryotube. 

The squirrel pounced, “How was this consent recorded?”

McCoy snorted, “Just look at the damned video: you’ll see him offer his arm. That’s good enough when you’re actually trying to save someone’s life, kid.” 

The lieutenant’s cheeks flushed, and he glanced at Raske.

Pushing his sudden advantage, McCoy sat back slightly in his chair and tried not to grin. They’d throw him in the brig and try him for treason if he grinned. “You never asked me how the tribble died.”

“What?” A blotch of red appeared on each of Raske’s cheekbones.

“You never asked me how the tribble died.”

Raske appeared suddenly guarded; Archer and Phlox interested.

“A decontamination sweep performed by an Orion freighter. We took cargo aboard and discovered the damn thing: my understanding of Orion agriculture protocol is that it’s not dissimilar to a lethal dose of ionizing radiation.” It was a slight stretch, of course, as not dissimilar and similar were not quite the same thing, but it was close enough to count in horseshoes so far as McCoy was concerned.

The room went silent.

 _Silent_.

After a moment, Archer said, “Thank you very much for joining us today, Doctor McCoy. Your participation has been most helpful.”

Lui stiffened, but Raske actually spoke up, elbowing his lieutenant as he said, “There are still outstanding questions about the use of an unapproved, untested treatment with no consideration for the ethical implications or potential for serious harm to the patient. What he did…”

Archer wasn’t willing to give any ground, cutting off the other man as he finished the sentence for him, “Was the best he could do, under terrible circumstances, and was ultimately successful given his considerable skill and dedication. You can hardly blame a man for that.”

The red blotches had spread to Raske’s neck, crawling their way up from his collar as he nearly shouted, “It’s moral luck!”

Archer’s gaze flickered to Phlox, then back to the others, “I don’t think I need to remind you that a ship’s doctor is counted on to make the best decision he can, and desperate circumstances sometimes make things less clear cut than when sitting in the medical law library.”

McCoy’s eyebrows just about hit his hairline. They were clearly referring to something very, very classified. Something that was going over the squirrel’s head as well, by the way he was frantically scrolling through his notes. Something that, if the look between Lui and Chandra was anything to go by, was having an impact.

Lui made the first move, setting her padd carefully to the side and fixing McCoy with a gaze the doctor couldn’t quite read as she said, “Thank you for joining us today, Doctor McCoy. I believe that was sufficient for our purposes, but please ensure your whereabouts are kept current in case we have further questions.”

“Of course, ma’am.” There were so many questions swirling around, but he could tell they wanted to talk without him present. Tucking his cover under his arm, McCoy left the room without glancing back.

It hit him the moment the doors shut: they had tried to take his goddamn medical license away. Suddenly wobbly in his knees, he strode past the ensign manning the entryway and headed for the exit as quickly as he could, feeling suddenly suffocated by the white walls.

The blustery weather hadn’t let up, but he headed into the plaza and sank onto a bench anyway, enjoying the bite of the wind like a penance. Looking up at the grey sky and tracing the occasional leaf, McCoy tried to make his mind deliberately blank. He needed some time, without all of this. If he could not think, just for half an hour… The wind picked up and a chill crawled up from his ankles, but he didn’t make a move to return inside.

“They’ve decided to release something pretty close to the truth.” 

McCoy’s eyes snapped open; he hadn’t realised he’d even closed them. Archer was standing over him, the Denobulan slightly behind. 

The admiral waved a hand and McCoy took his direction to slide sideways, making room on the bench. Facing across the plaza, rather than meeting McCoy’s eyes, Archer continued, “We’re going to have to be honest about Marcus, to some degree. We don’t want the public panicked about our relations with the Klingons, so that may be toned down, along with his reasoning, but the general facts will be on the record. Khan’s going to be painted as an uncontrollable element: the point where Marcus went rogue, was betrayed, and then tried to manipulate Kirk into behaving unethically. They’re going to highlight that Marcus attacked the Enterprise, and thus Marcus was ultimately responsible for Khan coming to control the Vengeance.”

McCoy gave a jerky nod without looking at the other man.

“Kirk’s probably going to come out a hero.”

McCoy felt suddenly old, remembering Jim’s reaction to the casualty totals. “I don’t know that he’d agree with you on that one.”

Archer snorted. “He did prevent an all-out war with the Klingons. Even if the public don’t recognize that, he entered the warp reactor, unprotected, and sacrificed himself to save everyone on his ship and another eight thousand on the ground, given where you’d have dropped.” As if sensing McCoy’s raised eyebrow, he added, “Some of the news channels have already plotted the trajectory.”

Vultures, all of them.

Archer rubbed his bare hands together, obviously feeling the chill as well as he continued, “Raske is still freaked out that you’ve discovered a way to raise the dead; Phlox was able to correct some of the misconceptions there.” McCoy risked a glance up and found the Denobulan watching him intently. “The official record is going to state that Kirk was clinically dead when removed from the reactor core, but reflect that prompt use of a cryotube and an arduous experimental treatment for radiation exposure allowed you to revive him. It’s going to highlight that without your considerable skills and expertise he’d be dead.” Archer gave a tight smile. “You’re going to be given a commendation, son.”

“Why did you…” McCoy wasn’t sure whether he wanted to ask why the admiral had come, or how he’d known what Raske would try to do.

Archer shrugged, “Chris was a good friend.” He exchanged a glance with the Denobulan, and added, “When I got my first command my father sat me down and gave me the full story of the oh-one’s missions. It’s rarely so cut and dry as what makes it into the official logs.”

Archer’s own namesake had been killed on that ship, McCoy remembered. Clearing his throat, he managed to speak over the wind, “Thank you.” The admiral clapped him on the back in a manner than reminded him so much of Jim. 

Standing, Archer’s eyebrows pulled together into a slight frown as he said, “The press… they can be aggressive about finding something positive to report after a tragedy. There’s not much I can do about that.”

McCoy nodded, resignedly. It had been bad enough after the destruction of Vulcan. With a smoldering trench in downtown San Francisco…

Phlox took a step closer, regarding the man on the bench carefully as he said, “Look after your captain, Doctor.”

McCoy had to swallow around the lump in his throat. “Always.”

The too-bright blue gaze seemed to look right through him, seeing things McCoy didn’t even recognize himself. After a moment, the alien softly added, “Look after yourself as well.”

The older men left, melting into the fog as McCoy watched from the bench. He spent another hour tangled in his own thoughts, then, numbly, stood and made his way to a transportation station. The ride to Starfleet Medical took only ten minutes; he still felt like a human popsicle when hit by the warm air of the lobby. 

Jim’s room was quiet; according to the monitors, the captain was deep in a real, restful sleep. A quick scan of the chart confirmed: no sleep-aid had been administered. That was a relief, at least. He wondered what Spock had said that morning.

It was after two in the afternoon and McCoy’s stomach chose that moment to rumble. He considered heading down to the cafe, but after the day so far felt vaguely nauseous. Instead, he opened the small fridge built into the wall and found a cup of applesauce amongst the medial supplies. They hadn’t started Jim on solid food yet, so no one would mind.

Settling into the chair next to the head of the bed, he peeled the top off the container and dug in, running the earlier events through his head.

Finishing the snack, he dropped the container into the recycling chute and slumped lower in the chair, tilting his head back as he kicked his legs out. God, he was tired.

“Bones?”

McCoy swam back to consciousness as if through a viscous liquid.

“Bones? Can you wake up?”

The doctor opened his eyes to find the room was dim; the sun had set while he’d been asleep.

“Hey,” Jim’s bed was still reclined, but he was clearly wide awake as he looked over at the doctor. “That position looked like hell on your neck.”

McCoy was suddenly aware of the terrible crick in the side of his neck and groaned, audibly, hands coming up to massage the area for a moment before he moved to raise the head of Jim’s bed and adjust the lighting. Spinning the chair so he could more easily face the other man, he settled back into the seat. “How are you feeling?”

“Tired. Which is stupid because all I seem to be capable of doing is sleeping.” Jim shifted slightly, which was about his range of movement at the moment. “Where were you this morning? M’Benga didn’t seem to know when he was prodding me.”

“The admirals had some questions and hauled me in. I hadn’t given evidence yet.” Sensing that Jim was going to ask how it went, he changed the subject, “Spock come by this morning?” Jim gave a small nod, so McCoy pressed, “He explain?”

“Yeah.” Jim frowned, “I think I sort of understood, too.”

“Damn Vulcan brain-manipulation.”

That got a small smile out of Jim. “It was a mind-meld, Bones. And I slept well afterwards.” A _finally_ went unspoken.

“So can you sense him?” A corner of McCoy’s mouth twisted upwards, despite himself. “You gonna be able to tell when him and Uhura…”

Jim’s cheeks flushed and he barked out a laugh, “Oh, god, I hope not. Can you imagine? I’d never be able to look him in the eyes at a senior staff meeting again.” Sensing the underlying concern from the doctor, he sobered. “I don’t think I’d have known if he hadn’t said anything, but he explained it all and then we did the meld. I felt a lot… calmer… and more in control afterwards. And got some real sleep this afternoon.”

“Did the bond break?”

“We don’t know.” Jim frowned, and the gesture was mirrored on the doctor’s face as well. “He says he can’t really sense me now, not at all like before. It’s hard to explain; I guess we’ll only really know if the shit hits the fan again and he comes running.”

McCoy’s insides twisted.

Jim must have read something on the doctor’s face, because he said, “Go home, Bones. Get some sleep.”

“Jim…”

“I’ll be just fine, and you look like you need it.”

McCoy couldn’t argue with that, and his neck was killing him. Rising from his chair, he set the lights and bed to respond to voice commands, then set a hand gently on Jim’s shoulder. “I know it’s frustrating, but get some rest too, okay?” When the other man responded with a small nod and an already tired blink, he gave the shoulder a gentle squeeze and left.

He didn’t go home. He went to a bar instead, which was a spectacularly stupid thing to do while still dressed in his greys. Thankfully, it happened to be a hole in the wall with table service so he crammed himself into a dark corner and proceeded to get spectacularly plastered on overpriced whiskey. The other patrons left him alone; he supposed there was a lot of that behavior in San Francisco these days and he knew he could look pricklier than a hedgehog when he wanted to.

Crawling into his bed with a roiling stomach at 0130, still wearing his dress trousers, McCoy shoved his face into his pillow and let himself black out.


	5. Secrets

McCoy woke up feeling like shit and smelling like sour alcohol. His mouth… he didn’t want to begin to describe what his mouth tasted like. A headache dialled itself up a notch as he realised it couldn’t be much after 0730, given the state of the sunrise. 

A gray light was filling the room; he’d forgotten to close the blinds. Rolling out of bed, he stumbled on shaky limbs over to the personal medical kit he normally kept in the bathroom. It took two tries to get the kit open properly and the prepared hypo in hand-- he tended to drop things when sporting a vicious hangover, and that morning was no exception. The dropsy, he giggled to himself, almost desperate to feel the bite of the hypo against his neck. God, how much had he had to drink?

The prepared hypo took a few seconds to take effect, then the headache faded and his stomach stopped threatening to empty itself. It was an improvement, but he still felt distinctly frayed around the ages. McCoy heaved a deep breath and let his head rest against the cool wall for a moment and dimly considered that they should warn you about what happens to hangovers once you’re over 30. It was a full minute before he trusted himself to stand without leaning on the counter, and another before he actually managed to get himself into the shower. 

The doctor’s day didn’t get any better after arriving at Starfleet Medical. Jim was awake and sitting up, and thus perfectly positioned to quirk an eyebrow at the other man’s appearance and, without a hair out of place himself, ask, “Did you get _any_ rest last night, Bones?”

He’d merely glowered in reply, snatching up a padd with Jim’s chart and scrolling through the data. According to M’Benga’s notes, Jim had taken some water orally the day before without any trouble swallowing, and external scans suggested cellular regeneration of his stomach lining had plateaued. In short, it was time to try weaning Jim off the intravenous nutrient infusion and return to solid food.

Rummaging through the fridge, he selected a pot of predigested nutritional supplement and a spoon, turning back to find Jim watching him, warily.

“No.” The earlier levity at McCoy’s appearance had vanished, and Jim was looking at the food like it could bite.

No? McCoy glanced down at the pot: standard issue, mild vanilla flavor but otherwise pretty bland. Guaranteed to be the least offensive thing for a recently regenerated GI tract. Hell, he’d seen Jim eat vanilla yoghurt plenty of times and this wasn’t too different. With a patience he didn’t feel, he explained, “You had some water yesterday just fine. We need to get you eating real food sooner rather than later; especially for starting physical therapy. I’m not quite sure how your GI tract is going to take food the first time, so this is the best bet.” 

“Come on, Bones. I _hate_ that stuff.” Unbelievable; nearly thirty and a toddler would be proud of the high pitched whine in the captain’s voice. 

Patience evaporating, McCoy shrugged and peeled open the container. “Well, it’s better than the alternative.”

“What’s the alternative?”

“Are you seriously asking me? It’s bland, but it’s not that bad.” McCoy could feel a pressure behind his eyes that had to be the hangover threatening to break through his carefully calibrated drug cocktail. “The alternative is I numb you and run a nasogastric line up your nose so we can introduce small quantities of food to your stomach directly.”

Jim’s lips thinned and he looked on the verge of saying something, but after a moment he exhaled, heavily. “Fine.” The concession was followed up with a positively petulant, “You do realize I can’t feed myself?” 

McCoy dropped a emesis bowl into Jim’s lap, then caught a small amount of white pap on the tip of the spoon and waved the implement in the air as he said, “Open up: here comes the shuttle.” 

Jim’s eyes narrowed in a manner that clearly conveyed, _fuck you, Bones_ , but opened his mouth nonetheless.

The grimace on Jim’s face when the spoon crossed his lips was real, but he managed to swallow quickly. McCoy loaded up another, slightly larger, spoonful and tried to ignore whatever was dancing in Jim’s eyes as he guided it to the other man’s lips. Three small spoonfuls followed. That was as far as they got before Jim flushed red, mumbled something indistinct and began to vomit.

Normally, McCoy had an iron stomach for that sort of thing, but on this particular morning it was enough to make him pivot sideways, still trying to hold Jim in a safe position to prevent aspiration, as he vomited his own coffee, one piece of toast, and what smelled suspiciously like whiskey tinged bile all over his own shoes. It was out quickly, at least, but humiliating nonetheless.

Ignoring the mess on the floor, he blinked back involuntary tears and forced himself to focus on his patient. It probably would have been worse if Jim’s muscles had actually been up to scratch, but as it was he’d settled into a soft retching that told McCoy he hadn’t aspirated anything, thank goodness. 

Thumbing the air filtration to maximum in an effort to kill the smell, he continued to support Jim over the emesis bowl until the retching stopped. Gently tipping the other man back onto the pillows, McCoy allowed himself a rueful smile. “Alright... that didn’t go well.” Jim gave a look of, _no shit_ , that made him chuckle, weakly, as he moved the emesis bowl to a counter and offered Jim a straw to sip some water while taking a cup for himself in his other hand.

When a few sips of water stayed down, Jim tilted his head away from the straw and grumbled, “Bones, your bedside manner leaves a lot to be desired. Anyone ever tell you that?”

McCoy snorted, shaking his head at the mess of his shoes and still feeling a bit wobbly. Damn, he was going to have to clean this one up himself. Calling in a staff member was completely out of the question. Putting that task aside for a moment, he focused back on Jim and asked, “You were swallowing fine. What happened?”

“You’re asking me to describe puking? Didn’t you just get your own first hand demonstration of how it works?”

Clamping down on a wave of irritation, he rolled his eyes and said, “Come on, Jim. You know what I’m asking. Any pain? Was there cramping…”

“No. It didn’t hurt… I just couldn’t keep it down. I told you that stuff doesn’t agree with me.” 

McCoy frowned, “That stuff is _designed_ to agree with everyone.”

Jim closed his eyes as he replied, “Well I’ve always been exceptional, haven’t I?”

“What the hell, Jim? You said you hate it, not that there’s a food intolerance missing from your file. I wouldn’t have given it to you if you’d said something.”

Jim simply ignored the doctor, although his jaw twitched as if he were clenching it tightly.

Shaking his head, McCoy set their cups aside and gingerly slipped off his shoes, thankful for once they didn’t have laces. The air filtration was taking care of the smell well enough, but his stomach gave another turn at having to crouch down over the mess. At least the rooms were well equipped for accidents: the handheld wet vac took care of most of the damage, and after dousing everything in an alcohol solution it didn’t feel too bad to slip the shoes back on. He stood to find Jim still had his eyes closed, but the monitors were borderline whether he was just settling into a light sleep or faking. 

There were a few spots of vomit on his trouser leg so he decided to let it go in favor of getting changed, and perhaps another hypospray for himself. Putting in a request for an antiemetic to be delivered in the next few hours, he headed over to his adjoining office to get changed.

As much as he groused about it, paperwork had always been something he could get lost in. A few dozen forms later he’d cleared a large chunk of the backlog of injury reports from the Khan affair that needed to get approved and entered into the formal medical logs. According to the monitors Jim had actually fallen asleep not long after he’d left the room and stayed that way for several hours. It was the headache that had actually pulled him out of the methodical work: either the handover cure had worn off or he should have actually tried to eat something again after puking all over the floor. Probably both. 

The problem with ‘fleet offices was they were far too shiny. McCoy could make out enough of his reflection in the polished desk to tell that he looked like someone sporting a four alarm hangover and the bags under his eyes would make a raccoon proud. The cafeteria held no appeal in his current state, but the only source of nearby food was the fridge in Jim’s room. Resigning himself to another meal of applesauce, he ran a hand over his hair in an effort to make it sit more normally, then submitted his work and logged off.

Jim was still asleep, but if the monitors were anything to go by he was likely to wake up soon. Keeping his footfalls light, McCoy rounded the bed and opened the fridge: two containers of applesauce; no problem if he ate one. Grabbing the nearest container and a spoon, he contemplated returning to his office until he spotted that the antiemetic had been delivered. Good. If Jim woke up soon they could try eating again.

Turning, McCoy dropped the spoon and it fell with a clatter. “Shit.” He followed it down, snagging it with his fingertips, then standing up quickly, only for the world to grey and tilt. He thought he managed to get out another curse before the floor seemed suddenly closer than it should be.

A familiar voice, but from far away: “Bones?” 

There was a short pause where color started to slowly bleed back into his vision.

Then the voice again, but closer this time, “Bones if you don’t get up I’m going to use the call system and I know you’d really hate to have someone peel you off the floor.”

Get it together, Leonard, he ordered himself. “M’okay.” 

The mumble was barely loud enough to make it up to the bed and Jim raised an eyebrow even though he couldn’t see the doctor, “Am I supposed to ignore the fact that you’re on the floor right now?”

The reality of the situation asserted itself and McCoy winced in embarrassment as he stumbled over an explanation. “Stood up too fast. Too much paperwork; hadn’t eaten.” No point bothering to mention the hangover, although Jim had likely guessed. He hauled himself into the bedside chair and waved a hand, dismissively. “I’m fine.” Discarding the original spoon in favor of a fresh one, he stilled his shaking hands, opened the container, and took a quick mouthful. It was an explosion of fruit sugars and, damn, he needed that. He wolfed down half the container before he realized Jim was staring at him. “Bite?” McCoy held out the spoon and was surprised to see the color drain from the other man’s face. Frowning as he backtracked, the doctor pulled the spoon back towards himself as he said, “Hey, I’m kidding. I’ll give you an antiemetic first.”

And Jim just gave him that same bullshit smile he’d tried the other day, quickly looking away towards the windows. “Fog’s been bad the last couple days.”

Was Jim Kirk seriously trying to talk about the weather? The fog was thicker than normal; he’d read something about the environmental grid being sent haywire by Nero’s drill and still not recalibrated properly. “Yeah, Karl really has it in for us today.” The joke from their academy days didn’t get even a glimmer of recognition, much less the snort it merited. 

Fine, McCoy could do businesslike when he needed to. He picked up the waiting hypo and jabbed it into Jim’s neck while the other man’s attention was still on the window.

“Dammit!’ That, at least, was more like Jim’s normal reaction to being hypo’d. He turned back from the window so fast he almost gave himself whiplash. “What the hell, Bones?”

“Told ya I’d give you an antiemetic, didn’t I? You want a repeat performance of earlier or not?”

Wishing he could rub at the injection site, Jim scowled. “Warn a guy, will you?”

McCoy shrugged, “They say it hurts less when it’s a surprise.” He opened the fridge and retrieved another pot of the nutritional supplement, grabbing an applesauce as well as an afterthought.

Jim had looked less skeptical when Barnett last tried to tell him that an upcoming diplomatic mission between warring factions would be a piece of cake. 

Holding up a forestalling finger, McCoy said, “The goop is the best thing for you Jim, and you really shouldn’t be able to have an intolerance to it, but if you’d prefer we can try applesauce.”

“Can’t I just have another IV?”

“Maybe for today, but the longer you go without eating the harder it’s going to be.”

“You don’t know that.”

Something inside McCoy twisted at having his understanding of Jim’s condition thrown back at him. Counting on his fingers, he enumerated, “I know we need to get your system working; I know you’ll need lots of energy to start physical therapy; and I know you’ll need to have been eating for a long while if you want to be cleared for active duty.”

Jim’s gaze had dropped to the blanket and his only reply was a soft, “Bones.”

McCoy realised his chest was heaving. The tension that had built during his list of reasons snapped and he sagged, slightly. “What?”

Jim’s gaze, usually so sure, skittered across the blanket like a water strider until he said, “Nothing.”

McCoy’s expression softened, even as his confusion increased. Treatment, he knew how to do that, so he peeled open the applesauce and prepared a spoon. “Jim?”

Jim held the applesauce in his mouth for five long seconds before he spat it out. It spattered wetly into the fresh emesis bowl, and left a trail across Jim’s chin that he couldn’t wipe off by himself.

“Try again, but have a sip of water first.” McCoy picked up Jim’s cup, holding the straw near the other man’s lips.

Twisting his head away, Jim replied, “I’m done, Bones. Just give me the IV.”

“You haven’t even tried.” 

A brittle silence stretched between them.

Then, with a glare that the doctor had seen before but never been on the receiving end of, Jim opened his mouth. 

Ignoring the look, he spooned a small amount of applesauce into Jim’s mouth, then said, “Swallow.”

Jim’s adam’s apple bobbed reflexively for a moment, then he swallowed. 

At first, everything looked fine and McCoy allowed himself a measure of relief. It was short lived when he noticed the fine drops of sweat beginning to bead on Jim’s brow. The antiemetic should… He didn’t get to finish the thought before Jim started retching again, watery applesauce dribbling back out of his mouth.

Cursing, McCoy helped Jim lean further forward, supporting him until the retching trailed off. Easing the captain back onto the pillows, McCoy swiped a soft cloth over his chin and neck. The gesture reminded him of how he’d washed Jim on Enterprise, when they hadn’t been sure if the captain would live or die all over again. For a moment he thought he could smell the sweat and excrement. Closing his eyes at the memory, he scrunched up the rag and tossed it in the direction of the counter.

Jim’s alive, McCoy reminded himself. He’s alive and right here. McCoy opened his eyes to find JIm watching him intently.

“You’ve got a headache.” Jim had seen the telltale furrowing of the doctor’s brow often enough over the years, and didn’t hesitate to jump on the knowledge.

“Just a bit.” Truth be told, it had been growing steadily since his little episode on the floor.

“Maybe…” Jim was looking somewhere over McCoy’s left shoulder. “Maybe you shouldn’t be my doctor anymore, Bones.”

The room suddenly didn’t seem to have enough oxygen.

Hurriedly, Jim continued, “I don’t mean forever, but you’re clearly running yourself ragged.”

What Bones wanted to say was, “Have you lost your fucking mind!” Instead, he only managed a strangled noise that Jim talked straight over.

“Get some rest. M’Benga can take over as my primary physician.” Jim gave that smile again and something seemed to fracture between them, “I’m not going anywhere. You can enjoy some downtime. Maybe visit your family.”

Visit his family? Now? Disbelief evaporated into anger. “Fine. I’ll get some rest.” McCoy dumped the still full applesauce container into the garbage chute with more force than was necessary. “See you in a day or two, Jim.”

He stormed out of the medical building without even collecting the padd from his office. The fog outside matched his mood, so he set off walking instead of heading to the transport hub. A few blocks later his pace slowed and he shivered; his headache was only growing and with it the urge to find a bar was diminishing. Turning back, he headed to the hub and navigated the route back to the apartment without really processing what he was doing. 

McCoy marched inside and took a resolute left turn without glancing towards the other bedroom. Stripping off his clothes, he left them trailing along the floor before grabbing his med kit and programming an extra-strong dose of sedative. Crawling into bed in just his underwear, he jabbed his own neck and breathed a sigh of relief as the world dissolved into darkness.

**********

He stayed away for three days. 

McCoy didn’t remember much of the first: just a dim sense of sleeping away the late afternoon and night after Jim’s bombshell, then waking late the following morning with only the energy to eat something and crawl back into bed. It was early evening on the first day that he properly swam back to consciousness, still feeling a bit ragged but grudgingly more rested.

A light rain was spattering on the windows and the view was reduced to a muddy swath of grey. Aware he’d been wearing the same pair of boxer briefs for two days he stripped them off and pulled on an Ole Miss sweatsuit that usually resided deep in a drawer. Wandering into the kitchen, he heated a bowl of uninspiring looking soup and ate it standing at the counter. There weren’t any messages waiting on the central apartment system, and turning on the holoscreen started up a newsloop still dominated by Vengeance and speculation about the ongoing inquiry. 

Turning off the news, he left the dirty bowl on the counter and retrieved a bottle of bourbon from the surprisingly well stocked cupboards. Stretching out on the L-shaped sofa gave him a panoramic view of the rain as he opened the bottle and poured himself a good three fingers. 

He woke up the morning of the second day to find himself still on the sofa with a burn of reflux in the back of his throat. A long, hot shower helped him feel more human, but didn’t bother to wipe the steam off the mirror as he towelled himself dry. No sense looking at what he had no interest in seeing. The Journal of Optogenetics, all six back issues he hadn’t got around to on Enterprise, provided enough of a distraction until the evening, with only a pause to heat another bowl of soup. 

By six-thirty McCoy was feeling itchy in his own skin so he pulled on some casual civilian clothes and his leather jacket, then headed out into the continuing drizzle. 

At the second bar he tried there was a woman with tits that went on for miles, and damned if he didn’t suddenly want to get a hold of them. She was lean and blonde and thankfully at least roughly age appropriate in a city swarming with cadets and students. Running a hand through his hair to muss it slightly, McCoy wove his way through the crowd and dialled up his southern charm as he slipped onto the next stool. 

It looked promising for all of five minutes, then: “Len… Are you Leonard _McCoy_? From the Enterprise?”

He tried a wink, but his heart wasn’t in it anymore. “Same one, darlin.”

Interest blossomed more brightly in her eyes as she said, “Oh my God! On the news they said you saved the Captain’s life. I can’t believe I’m meeting you!” She glanced around the bar as if afraid someone else had heard the exchange and would want to join them. “Shall we get out of here?”

The invitation couldn’t have been more clear, but his arousal had evaporated. “Actually, I’m afraid I was just interested in saying hi.” He slipped off the stool with as much dignity as he could muster. “Gotta go-- meeting a friend.”

McCoy hurried out without a backwards glance, then caught the transit back to the apartment. He didn’t even bother to go to his bedroom, instead sitting in the panoramic living room as he relieved his frustration with his own hand followed by the rest of the bottle of bourbon.

The third day started the same as the previous one, with sleeping late, a not immoderate hangover, and a long shower. It was the weekend and football games were on so he took up residence on the sofa, drinking beer and eating mostly potato chips all afternoon. As the light dwindled outside he could feel his skin beginning to crawl all over again. 

Dressing with a little more care, he pulled on an unbuttoned henley, jeans and his leather jacket, electing to keep the five o’clock shadow. He chose the venue more carefully as well: a dark, anonymous hole in the wall people only frequented for one reason. True to expectations, it was anonymous and hot and when the other man bit the side of his neck as he stroked them off he came harder than he could readily remember. No obligations, no names. His partner had slipped out of the dark storeroom and back into the main part of the venue without a word.

Later, lying in his own bed, chafed, with a throbbing neck and a swimming head, McCoy wondered when the fuck his life had got so screwed up.

The fourth morning he woke up to a message waiting light in the comm system. Spock. Because of course it fucking was. The message was short:

_Jim informs me he hasn’t seen you in several days._

Because of course it was all about fucking Jim.

Fucking Jim. He felt a hysterical giggle override his frustration; maybe not quite that. He regarded the bite mark in the mirror, realizing it would sit just over his collar and he didn’t have a dermal regen unit handy in his personal kit. An oversight: he’d taken it to medbay for recalibration and never returned it. Deliberately dressing in his civvies instead of his medical uniform, he caught the transit over to Starfleet Medical after breakfast.

Jim was sitting up in bed, a padd balanced on his lap, and seemed to be more in control of his posture than several days ago. The captain glanced up as soon as the door opened, and managed to thumb off whatever he’d been looking at instead of using a voice command. 

Awkwardly moving to stand at the foot of the bed, McCoy offered a slightly gruff, “Mornin’.”

Jim opened his mouth to reply, then his gaze flickered to McCoy’s collar and he closed his mouth, unreadable for a second before he smirked and said, “Not quite the kind of relaxation I had in mind, Bones.” Evidently James Tiberius Kirk, winner of hypocrite of the year, had elected to collect his award in person. 

The mark itself was unmistakable and had settled into a deep reddish purple over night with three distinct points that were clearly made by teeth. He could have regened it in his office before coming to Jim’s room; couldn’t say why he hadn’t. 

Ignoring the barb, McCoy pulled a chair up to the bedside and waved at the padd, “They better not be letting you work.”

Jim frowned, “I think M’Benga put parental controls on it. Not only can I not get into the Starfleet databases, I swear it was suggesting children’s films when I first turned it on.”

“You watch the game yesterday?”

Jim shrugged, which was a good sign, as it meant he was getting more control over his body. “Fell asleep in the fourth quarter and woke up to discover I’d missed a touchdown.”

They talked about football, which was a good, safe, topic for two men who had both played in high school. Jim kept smiling in that way that would fool the nurses, but McCoy knew never made it to his eyes. He left without bothering to check Jim’s chart.


	6. Truths

He didn’t go back to visit Jim the following day. 

The weather was clear so McCoy bundled up in casual clothes and walked, just walked, for kilometers. All the way to Ocean Beach, where he took off his shoes and walked in the sand until his feet were numb from the late October chill. The Pacific wasn’t _his_ ocean, but in a pinch it made him feel at home. The sound of the waves could take him back to being eight years old when his dad had taken him, just him, out to Savannah for a medical conference. Leonard had played on a padd during the talks, and as soon as the sessions were done for the day they’d gone to the beach. He’d never seen something so big in his whole life. Closing his eyes he tried to ignore the chill and go back to that day: sand between his toes, fresh salty air, a faint whiff of low tide, and the sighing and hushing of the waves.

By the time he got back to the apartment it was the evening and his feet were blistered. Sitting on the sofa, he dabbed at the inflamed and torn flesh with dermal cream pilfered from Enterprise, wincing at the sting. It was tempting to go out again. To seek a strange kind of comfort from being wanted by an anonymous stranger. God, it was tempting, despite the fact his feet really weren’t up for it. Instead, he pulled on his threadbare sweats and heated some dinner. 

The door chimed just as he was pouring himself a drink. Shoving the glass and bottle out of sight, he answered the door to find Spock on the other side.

Raising an eyebrow at the state of McCoy’s clothing, as well as his bare feet, the Vulcan stepped into the apartment without waiting to be invited. Presumptuous bastard. 

Spock surveyed the room and McCoy blushed, as if the man could sense what he’d done in the front room the other night. After a moment, Spock pulled something out from behind his back and held it out. It was the padd McCoy had left in his office almost a week ago; the one with the direct connection to the Starfleet Medical database.

McCoy reached out and tried to take the device, frowning when Spock didn’t immediately release his hold.

“You have a barely observable tremor in your hand, Doctor.”

Aggressively flippant, McCoy gave a shrug. “Not a good trait for a surgeon.” He tugged sharply, and the padd came free as he added, “Fortunately, I’m not on duty.”

“Indeed.” 

There was more in that raised eyebrow than McCoy wanted to consider. He dropped the padd none too gently onto the counter, realizing too late the gesture was unlikely to go unnoticed.

“I hope the apartment is to your liking, Doctor.”

Vulcan small-talk; never a strength. Forcing a grin, he waved a hand. “It’s great, Spock. I don’t want to know what favors you had to call in.”

“Nyota wishes to inquire whether you would like to join us for dinner this weekend.”

Not particularly, if he was honest, but knew Uhura was unlikely to be dissuaded. “Yeah, sure.” 

Having apparently exhausted his subjects of conversation, Spock inclined his head, slightly and said, “Nyota also wishes to convey her appreciation for what you did, and hopes that you are, as she said, looking after yourself.”

McCoy felt a twist of something deep in his gut, but brushed it aside. “Tell her thanks.”

Spock fixed the doctor with one last, searching, look, before he nodded and took his leave.

Ignoring the padd, McCoy spent ten minutes halfheartedly cleaning the kitchen. Eventually, he gave the counter one last swipe and retrieved the half-poured drink from where he’d tucked it behind the cutting boards. 

He capped the bottle without pouring any more, but took the glass over to the sofa. Curling into the familiar folds of his Ole Miss sweats, he tucked his knees up as he took a sip of bourbon. How he’d picked up a mother henning Vulcan was beyond him; it had to be Uhura’s doing. Lord knows Spock didn’t care like that. Not about him, anyway. Flicking on the holoscreen, he turned it to a movie and let himself get lost in what passed for a plot. 

The next morning McCoy shuffled into the kitchen and found the padd on the counter where he’d dropped it the evening before. He ignored it as he made coffee; he could ignore most things before he had a coffee in his system. Preferably two.

He ignored it as he made himself a plate of toast, then as he ate it. He even ignored it as he swept up the crumbs that were scattered across the countertop. The weather was still clear so he pulled on a thicker pair of socks and his actual running shoes and left the apartment before he had to ignore the padd a minute longer.

Three weeks was a long time without exercise and a breakfast of coffee and toast was not the best idea either; he found himself wheezing harshly before he’d gone a kilometer. Slowing to a walk, McCoy shoved his hands deep into the pockets of his sweatshirt and wished he’d worn sweatpants instead of shorts. The wind was cold, but he forced himself to walk faster, determined to make it into Golden Gate Park. He’d run the full circuit there with Jim, years ago, when the younger man had decided they both had to pass the advanced PT course in order to test out of the regular program. He’d cursed him out like crazy and Jim had just grinned and said that if Leonard could curse like that he wasn’t running fast enough.

McCoy forced himself to jog, grimacing at the pain until his body grudgingly warmed up and the endorphins started flowing. He jogged until he had to walk, then forced himself to jog again; emptying his mind of everything but the rhythmic pounding of his feet.

By the time he returned to the apartment his half-healed feet were inflamed and torn all over again, despite the more appropriate footwear. Grimacing at the blood on his socks, he peeled off his sweaty clothing and hobbled into a long, hot shower where he roughly stroked himself off without thinking of anything or anyone in particular. 

Wandering back into his bedroom wearing just a towel, McCoy stretched out on the bed and drifted into a doze. He woke up to his right foot stinging painfully where an oozing blister had stuck to the blanket. Lifting his head revealed it was dark outside and he groaned; his circadian rhythms had gone straight to hell. 

Padding into the kitchen, bare feet tender on the polished floor, he heated a plate of food and wandered over to his usual place on the sofa. Stretched out, plate balanced low on his belly, McCoy ate with his fingers while half paying attention to a documentary on the holoscreen. Spock’s unexpected visit the night before kept coming to mind: the padd, the aborted small talk, the comment about his hands. He’d been mulling it over for a full hour before he realized Spock hadn’t said a word about Jim during the visit.

Ignoring the padd on the counter, he returned to his bedroom and pulled on an old pair of jeans and a sweatshirt, then gingerly eased his feet back into a loose pair of shoes. It was almost midnight, but the medical center was never strictly open or closed. Not to him. 

The night was clear and cold, a breeze ruffling his hair while he waited for the transit. Thrusting his hands deep into his coat pockets, he stretched his back and relished the sensation of being out in the fresh air. Earthside. 

The transport was mostly empty and moved quickly across the city. McCoy sat next to a window, watching everyone _living_. Young couples wrapping up dates, groups of friends, late workers hurrying home, bars and fast food restaurants lit up and spilling patrons into the street.

The medical center was quiet, lights turned down to a nighttime cycle. McCoy kept his tread soft all the way down the hall and into Jim’s room. The lights were fully off, but the doctor’s presence triggered the main monitor to turn on with a low glow, just enough to illuminate Jim sleeping on his back. 

Soft breaths, a slight hitch on the intake that McCoy was familiar with. Jim. Alive. Softly, softly, he took careful steps over to the head of the bed. Fast asleep, by the look of it. He could just make out the curve of Jim’s eyebrows and the smudges of his eyelashes. The silhouette of his nose. A sharp cheekbone stood out in the low light, and the doctor frowned. 

McCoy reached over to the controls and dialled the lights to their minimum setting. 

There was a thin line running up Jim’s right nostril, but his features were gaunt and the skin under his eyes had a slight bruising that spoke of stress and poor sleep. He didn’t look like he was getting better. He looked worse. 

McCoy felt ill and murmured, softly, “What the hell, Jim?” M’Benga was a good, scratch that, _great_ doctor. This didn’t make any goddamn sense.

Jim’s breathing hitched more clearly and he shifted slightly on the bed, a faint whine that trailed off into a huff of breath and a frown. 

Forgetting himself, McCoy placed a soft hand on Jim’s shoulder and hushed, “Shhhh.” 

A mumbled, “‘’Ones?”

Slipping his hand up to cup Jim’s forehead, McCoy brushed back the other man’s hair, then let his hand linger for longer than was necessary. “Just a nightmare, Jim. Go back to sleep.”

“Mmmmm.” There was the barest flicker of eyelashes, then Jim seemed to sink back down into sleep. They’d drugged him; he usually didn’t go right back out after a nightmare.

It was almost two o’clock in the morning when he got back to the apartment, but McCoy poured himself a cup of coffee and carried his medical padd over to the sofa. He had a feeling he wasn’t going to like what he was about to see.

According to the chart, they’d started physical therapy, with some improvement in range of voluntary motion, but Jim was losing muscle mass overall, the regimen of total parenteral nutrition not quite enough to keep up with the strain. Skimming down further, there was a note for neuromuscular electrical stimulation to try and stem the tide until Jim was eating properly and had more energy for therapy. There wasn’t a note about nightmares, but an annotation suggested Jim’s sleep hadn’t been strictly restful. 

McCoy rubbed a hand over the back of his neck, remembering the dark smudges under Jim’s eyes. It didn’t make any damn sense. M’Benga had run a nasogastric line and Jim’s body had taken a nutritional supplement under heavy sedation, but awake the retching and vomiting had continued when he tried to eat or took food through the line.

He’d brought Jim back to life either with a fucked GI tract that could likely prevent him from being cleared for full active duty and reliant on an IV, or something that was even harder to understand. Scrolling back through the previous days he had to conclude that M’Benga had been thorough: every test he would have performed had been logged, appropriate drugs had been tried, even a psych consult the day before. Despite it all, Jim wasn’t getting better.

A second pass through the chart didn’t surface any thoughts on what could have been missed. Hell, he couldn’t even think of a suggestion for M’Benga. The doctor, so far as Bones could tell, was doing everything right.

Setting aside the padd, he closed his eyes and tried to carefully think back through everything that had occurred after the transfusion, forcing himself to relive every terrifying day and every drug provided. 

Nothing from the treatments or scans stood out, beyond knowing Jim’s sensitive gastrointestinal tissues had been regenerated following extensive radiation damage, but he remembered something that had struck him as odd: Jim’s words the day he’d told McCoy to sign off as his doctor: “I _hate_ that stuff.” Despite all his stays in the med bay, McCoy couldn’t recall subjecting the captain to anything worse than the occasional applesauce or watery soup. He couldn’t recall any intolerances being noted on Jim’s medical records either. Pulling up Jim’s full file, McCoy scanned it but couldn’t see any obvious time he’d been fed the stuff. That said, it would have been considered so routine it would have been unlikely to even be logged. 

Going year by year, nothing stood out: Jim’s birth; inoculations; a fever as an infant; schoolboy allergies; a broken arm at eight; broken finger at nine; Rigellian pox at ten; another broken arm at eleven with concussion observation, something to do with a hayloft; dermaseal of a gash on his chin at twelve; concussion observation at fifteen… there seemed to be about an entry a year, then more frequently since joining Starfleet. And once in command, many more. McCoy was impressed by his own volume of contributions to Jim’s records. He tried a few halfhearted keyword searches, in case he’d missed anything while skimming, but the computer drew a blank as well.

Eventually, eyes gritty and burning with exhaustion, he shut down the padd and went to bed.

The next morning McCoy woke around ten to find the weather socked in again, with a light patter of rain against the glass. Remembering his fruitless slog through the medical records the night before, he lay in bed turning the chart over and over in his head until he had to admit defeat and get up.

There was a top priority message alert blinking on his padd, which was odd, as it simply wasn’t done if you could just call instead. Stomach sinking, he sat down and braced himself for another summons to testify. Opening the file revealed a one line message that just about made McCoy fall off the sofa: 

_From: Pike, C. [Admiral]_ {Flag: Deceased}  
_To: McCoy, L. [CMO: USS Enterprise]_

_If important, keep digging._

He read it three times to be sure it was actually what he thought he was seeing, then checked the meta-data on the message as well. It was a bona-fide message from Pike’s account, sent from beyond the grave. It could have been set-up ages ago, to be triggered if the central computer registered a set of criteria. But what? Jim’s near death? That didn’t make sense, as in that case it should have been sent weeks ago. His own half-hearted searches in Jim’s medical files earlier that morning made him pause. _James Tiberius Kirk + meal supplements_ ; _James Tiberius Kirk + prolonged nausea_ ; and even _James Tiberius Kirk + anorexia nervosa_.

Was there something more to know, despite the negative results? Something Pike had somehow been aware of, either directly or through his own higher security clearance? McCoy connected to the main medical database and tried more queries, all variations of the theme, but no results appeared and no more mysterious messages appeared in his inbox.

He finally put in a computer query to cross-reference the personal history of James Tiberius Kirk and Christopher Pike. The computer came up blank, but several seconds later the priority message alert lit up. Curiosity and trepidation filled him in equal measures as he opened the new message:

_From: Pike, C. [Admiral]_ {Flag: Deceased}  
_To: McCoy, L. [CMO: USS Enterprise]_

The message was dominated by an image of a youngish man wearing lieutenant’s stripes: unmistakably Christopher Pike. He was carrying what first looked like a large bundle of dirty rags, until McCoy realised it was a person wrapped up in a filthy blanket. A boy, going by the shaggy haircut, with sharp cheekbones and a protruding collarbone. Everything about the boy, from his filthy hair to the blanket, was stained a dusty brown as if he’d been dragged behind a plow. One stick thin lower leg was dangling out of the blanket, as if all the substance had been pared away from the bone. The boy’s eye sockets appeared sunken, but the gaze was an unmistakable piercing blue.

_He hacked the system the morning he enlisted and tried to wipe his standing as one of the Tarsus Nine. We let him because Archer said accusations of nepotism and being the Kelvin baby were enough to deal with at the time._

_It was never in his public file and he didn’t seem to remember me, so I didn’t bring it up. I never wanted him to think it was all because I felt sorry for him. I’ve meant every word I ever said to Jim._

McCoy felt like he’d been sucker punched in the solar plexus, and for a moment couldn’t breathe. “Holy shit, kid.” He traced an index finger over the small face in the picture and murmured, again, “Holy shit.” Not just Tarsus, but one of the _Tarsus Nine_. He’d been at Ole Miss when the information had started trickling to Earth: an exotic fungus, crop failure, a request for aid. Then a deafening roar that dominated the news cycle for months. Famine. Four thousand murdered. Eugenics. Kodos presumed dead, but only nine credible witnesses and no way to say for sure. 

Stories of the Tarsus children: parents murdered, banding together to scrounge food, eating the contaminated soil, whispers of adults resorting to cannibalism of the most vulnerable. He knew, then, that Jim had to be one of the children described on the news cycle: one who had led a ragtag group of younger children and was credited with keeping them alive through the horrors.

He wanted to run to Jim. Hug him until their ribs crushed and every ounce of suffering drained right out of them and all that was left was just the two of them, merged into one. The boy’s expression in the picture: near death, yet defiant. That was his James T. Kirk… even though the boy’s gaze seemed to go right through the camera. Jim must have been thirteen or fourteen. Jesus, where had he been at that age? Eating peach pie in Georgia. Sun-filled afternoons. Deciding he wanted to be a doctor, like his father. Kissing girls behind his grandfather’s barn. The expression on Pike’s face was grim, as if he would personally tear Kodos apart with his bare hands if the governor was still alive.

McCoy thought he was going to be sick. What the fuck was he going to do?

A half hour of sitting, numbly, on the sofa and that was still the question: what the fuck was he going to do? It made more sense now. Some of it, anyway: the reaction to the nutritional supplement; the difficulty with the nasogastric tube. They’d probably tried both of those after Tarsus as they weaned him back on to food. The disrupted sleep was no surprise either, under the circumstances. Why Jim had sent him away… that he needed to hear from Jim himself. 

Carefully setting down the padd, he wandered into the bathroom and a long, hot shower to wash the tension out of his shoulders. He shaved, carefully. Even styled his hair, as much as he ever did, anyway. He was briefly tempted to pull on his medical uniform, but that was still Jim’s choice. Passing over the uniform, McCoy found an old, familiar sweater and a well worn pair of jeans. He’d owned both since the academy and knew Jim would remember them well. The fall of their third year had been particularly chilly and he’d practically lived in the synthetic cashmere as they dashed from dorms to informal study sessions. 

The soft material brought back a memory of being incredibly drunk after mid-semester exams; Jim’s arm snaking over his shoulders, unclear who was holding up whom as they staggered onto the lawn. The answer had been no one, as they collapsed into a laughing tangle of limbs. Somehow, Jim’s head had ended up pillowed on McCoy’s stomach, even as he’d called out to a passing cadet in a miniskirt, “Heyyyyy.”

She’d laughed at them, he remembered, raising her eyebrows suggestively as she kept walking.

As the girl rounded the corner, Jim had wriggled and flipped over, cheek pressing into McCoy’s chest. “You’re soft, Bones.”

He’d snorted. Said something like: “And you’re cut off,” even as his hand had come up to tangle in Jim’s short hair. 

Quashing the memory, he pulled out his boots and tugged them on, then grabbed his padd and headed for the transit.

By the time he arrived at the medical center McCoy was no closer to having decided on a course of action. “Hey Jim, Pike sent me a note from beyond the grave and while you’re still kind of an asshole your unspeakable childhood trauma explains a lot,” was not a plausible opener. Wishing he had a drink in him for courage, but knowing that was a spectacularly bad idea, he squared his shoulders and opened the door to Jim’s room.

Jim was propped up in bed, looking utterly exhausted; the smudges under his eyes worse than the night before. For a fraction of a second he’d appeared pensive, then as soon as he caught sight of the visitor a weary smile had alighted on his face. 

For a moment McCoy felt his resolve falter; then he realized Jim’s smile wasn’t quite reaching his eyes. He moved to stand by the foot of the bed rather than pulling up a chair. All of the possible words he’d considered on the tram fled, and he softly said, “I wish you’d told me.”

That bullshit smile from the last week slowly faded from Jim’s face, replaced by something more obviously guarded. In a voice that came out thin and almost brittle, Jim asked, “Told you what, Bones?”

McCoy didn’t say anything. Instead, he took a step and moved to sit on the foot of Jim’s bed, reaching down to place a hand over a blanket covered ankle and giving it a gentle squeeze.

Emotions flickered across Jim’s face almost too quickly to perceive. 

McCoy could see the moment Jim realized the answer: everything.

Something crumpled in Jim’s face, but McCoy didn’t move, only giving the ankle another squeeze.

Taking a shuddering breath, Jim forced himself to meet the other man’s gaze as he said, “I just thought I could tough it out, Bones. Until I realized I couldn’t.”

McCoy simply waited, because there was still more to say.

“I’ve been hiding it for so long. I don’t know how not to. And I couldn’t bear you looking at me differently. Everyone did, at first, then they never treated me the same.” Jim’s gaze skittered down to the blanket, then his jaw tightened and he looked back to McCoy, “I knew you wouldn’t let up until I ate, and I just can’t lie to you, Bones.” He looked towards the window, eyes glimmering wetly in the light. With a blink and sniff he cleared his throat, roughly, and seemed to bring himself back under control. “How did you find out? I thought I got rid of those records.”

“You did.” McCoy gave the ankle another squeeze and offered a wry smile. “I haven’t seen the classified records on Tarsus, but there was no trace of it in the files I could access.” Jim’s forehead creased and the doctor knew what he had to do. “Someone who never looked at you differently told me.” Activating his padd, he pulled up Pike’s second note and gently tossed the device into Jim’s lap.

“Oh…” Jim trailed off, and appeared to be mirroring McCoy’s initial reaction to the message. He slid a hand up next to the padd, reaching out to touch a finger to the image.

McCoy would have told you he knew Jim better than anyone, but from his seat on the foot of the bed he couldn’t read the expression on the other man’s face. Out of the corner of his eye the flashing yellow of the pulse and respiration monitor clamored for attention.

Softly, Jim began to talk. And once he began to speak it was almost as if it became hard to stop. “I remember him. I mean, I always remembered him, but never that it was _Pike_. We’d been hiding in the woods, but the ground cover had started to die too so we’d moved into an abandoned barn. I’d been stealing food for us, but there was never enough and Kodos’ guards had caught me the last time. They beat me and dumped me in the street; I think they thought I was done, but I managed to get up and run away. I hadn’t been able to go back for days and had been parceling out a box of ration crackers, but it wasn’t enough. Meribelle, Kevin’s little sister, was going to die. She was almost three years old and I swear she weighed about as much as a doll. 

“They killed my aunt and uncle, and my cousin, in the antimatter chambers. Kodos’ men had come with lists; I was on one, and they were all on another. We watched our families get marched into the facility, and no one came out. Kodos summoned me that night: the son of the hero of the Kelvin. There was so much food, Bones, in the governor’s mansion. I think…” Jim’s finger traced an arabesque whorl over the surface of the photo, “I think he was going to make me his son. Or something. He told me I was going to live there, but that night I grabbed as much as I could carry and ran. 

“Kevin and Meribelle from the next farm over had been on the kill list, but their parents had been suspicious. Had hidden them in an attic. I think they’d expected Kodos to save healthy adults at the expense of the elderly and children. Others had done it too. There were ten of us at first, but Adam, he was fifteen, went on a food run and never came back. Rachel got a fever and just didn’t wake up one morning.

“It was just me, Bones, and seven kids all smaller than me. We heard people outside the barn so I gave Kevin the last cracker and told him to run while I attacked them to try and give the kids time to get away. It was just after dawn and still not very light out so I couldn’t really see who was there, but I managed to get up and take them on as they opened the door to the stables. I marched right up to the man in the front and kicked him in the balls as hard as I could.

Jim barked out an utterly humorless laugh. “It turned out to be an ensign from Pike’s ship; I torqued his testicle and everything. They started yelling that they were Starfleet and it was okay and I collapsed into the dirt like someone had turned up the gravity. I could hear the ensign cursing and a call for medical attention and someone else trying to round up the other kids. I don’t know how long I’d been lying in the dirt before someone was there, wrapping me in a blanket and picking me up. I think I struggled at first, but he held tight. 

“He was strong and he smelled clean and he was telling me, _promising_ me, it was going to be okay and I felt safe for the first time in weeks, maybe years. I remember falling asleep and thinking maybe this was what it felt like to have a father.”

Jim remembered the man’s words, muttered into his hair as they left the dust and the horror of Tarsus behind: _It’s going to be okay, son._

And again, the night they took the Enterprise away from him: _It’s going to be okay, son._

“Oh, God. It _was_ Pike. It was him, Bones. All along.” Something kept tightly in check for so long seemed to splinter and Jim was mortified to feel his eyes well up with tears. There was a sense of motion he couldn’t see, and then Bones was there, sitting twisted on the side of the bed so that Jim could tip forwards into a tight hug. 

Wetly, against the junction of McCoy’s neck and shoulder, muffled words: “What do we do, Bones? I want to get better, but I just can’t.”

McCoy’s voice was a comforting rumble through both their frames. “We’ll figure something out, Jim. We always do.”

Neither of them had heard the door open. When Jim eventually lifted his head from the crook of McCoy’s neck he froze. There were two others standing just inside the door: Uruha appeared absolutely stricken, Spock about as unsettled as a Vulcan could get. 

Jim felt his stomach twist, painfully, and he weakly pulled back from the other man’s embrace as he asked, “How much did you hear?”

Uhura gulped, gaze flicking between Jim’s face and McCoy’s back. “Just… just that you want to get better, but can’t.”

Spock took a step forwards, eyebrow climbing as he asked, “Has there been a further side effect from the transfusion, Doctor?”

They could lie. Bones didn’t turn to face the others, simply quirked an eyebrow in a question to Jim, clearly signalling he would say whatever the captain wanted.

They could lie, but… Jim gave a little nod. Imperceptible, unless you knew how to read him. They were going to tell the truth, or, rather, McCoy was going to tell the truth. Taking a breath, the doctor turned and considered just what to say. Meeting the others’ eyes, he tried to give a reassuring smile. “No, Spock. Nothing like that. The radiation was particularly bad for the epithelial cells in his GI tract. The whole thing regenerated with the serum, but we’ve been having trouble getting Jim eating again.” Sensing their confusion, he slid a hand down to grip Jim’s knee as he added, “Jim was on Tarsus.” And _there_ , he saw what Jim meant. Uhura flinched, visibly, and something flickered through Spock’s eyes. “His body managed to take some food through the tube under sedation, but it hasn’t worked while he’s awake.”

Jim picked up the story himself, softly filling in details that McCoy had started to suspect: “Once we were rescued they tried to feed me small amounts of a nutritional supplement, but when a nurse wasn’t watching I got out of bed and found a cart of real meals and ate as much as I could hold. I blacked out and had a heart attack, then vomited whenever they tried to feed me after that; too afraid it would happen again.”

“How did you regain the ability to eat?” Trust the Vulcan to get straight to the point.

“There was a lieutenant on the rescue ship. He picked me up from the surface and must have spent about all his off duty time with me in the medical bay. Maybe more. I couldn’t eat properly for a long time, but he was always there and, eventually, he helped me stay calm and try.” It had been worse than that, of course. Pike holding him as he cried and vomited; a firm, but kind, voice telling him that he had to stay calm and eat. Brushing his sweaty hair back from his forehead and the tears from the corners of his eyes. “I guess… I guess some of this is so similar it brought it all back.” 

“Couldn’t… Spock help with that?” The three men looked to Uhura in surprise and she continued, “Couldn’t he help you relax while Leonard administers something through the feeding line?”

Jim’s gaze shuttered and he shook his head, the words coming out mixed-up in his urgency, “No, the memories; I don’t want to share…”

Spock cut him off: “On the contrary, Jim. There need not be any transfer of memories.”

Tamping down his more visceral reaction, McCoy raised an eyebrow. “What are you proposing?”

Uhura and Spock exchanged a glance, she was clearly more up to speed on Vulcan touch-telepathy than McCoy was. After a moment, Spock said, “A very low-level mind meld. I can simply share a Vulcan meditation technique through the connection, nothing more.”

Jim’s heart was thumping at the thought of it; he was sure they could hear it across the room. Hell, Spock probably could. Bones’ hand on his knee was an anchor and somehow that was enough to let him say, “Okay.” He felt Bones’ hand give a little tightening of surprise so he repeated, “Okay. I’ll try it.” Aiming for levity, he added, “But don’t blame me if I throw up on you.”

No one smiled, but Uhura took a step closer to the bed and in an almost conspiratorial tone said, “If you throw up on me, Captain, I think I’ll have to let you call me Nyota.”

With that, he realized it was okay for her to know, and the relief from that alone seemed to make his stomach settle enough that he felt ready to try. Now. “Let’s do it.”

Bones gave him a look that seemed to say, “Now?” But quickly quelled it, climbed off the bed and started fussing with supplies. Of course Jim wanted to try something new _now_.

Spock moved around to the far side of the bed, perching near the edge. At a signal from the doctor, he brought up his right hand into the now familiar position.

Jim was aware of the room: Bones, Uhura and Spock, but there was a faint scent of incense and it was as if his mind had been doused in cool cotton wool. He lost track of time. From far away, McCoy’s voice, “I’m stopping there.” And Jim wondered at that for a moment, before there was only the cool certainty that everything was fine again.

Slowly, the numbness receded and the room came back into sharp focus. Spock looked tired, but there was a twitch of something around Bones’ mouth that might have been a smile.

“It’s been an hour, Jim.”

_An hour_? Uhura was actually smiling over Bones’ shoulder and Jim couldn’t help a cautious smile himself. “I take it I don’t get to call you Nyota?”

McCoy barked out a laugh, consulting a scanner for a moment before snapping it closed. “You’ve got about five-hundred calories in you and it seems to be staying put. How do you feel?”

Turning his attention inwards, Jim blinked in surprise. “I feel… full.” And not just full: fine. It had worked. He still felt absolutely exhausted, but the stress of the last week seemed to have receded.

The others seemed to have picked up the rest of the change as well; even McCoy’s habitually worried countenance seemed to ease.

Spock stood, a slight furrow between his eyebrows the only overt sign of the effort expended. “I require meditation, however, will be able to return this evening should you wish to repeat the procedure.”

Uhura moved to loop her elbow around Spock’s arm, giving the two men a small smile as she guided her partner towards the door. “Take care, both of you.”

They saw themselves out and McCoy settled into tidying up the feeding supplies. He finished to find Jim watching him, tiredly. Perching back on the edge of the bed, he asked the one question that was still on his mind: “What the hell were you doing out there, Jim? Your medical records the previous and subsequent years were all from Earth. I thought you grew up in Iowa.”

“My stepdad said I was uncontrollable.” Jim paused, thinking. “He was probably right: I’d dumped my dad’s car into a canyon when Frank threatened to sell it. My mom was in the black and my brother and Frank were constantly fighting; they thought some time with my aunt and uncle would be good for me.”

They sat in silence, digesting the story. Eventually, Jim shook himself out of the memories and asked, “Will you be my doctor again, Bones?”

McCoy considered, remembering the bite of a stranger’s teeth against his neck and numbed, bloodied feet. “No.” He felt Jim stiffen and hurried to explain, “I think I’ve been the definition of emotionally compromised this past week. I’ll be here, I promise, but I want M’Benga reviewing your charts.”

Jim didn’t look happy about it, but he nodded that he understood. 

There was a real color in Jim’s cheeks that had been missing for a long time, but he still looked exhausted so McCoy lowered the head of the bed slightly, but not all the way. “Try to have a nap, okay? I’ll be working next door until you wake up.”

Jim barely tried to fight it; his eyes closed and the monitor quickly showed a slump into sleep. McCoy spent another minute fussing in the room: putting away scanners that could have stayed out, then returned to his office.

There was a priority message waiting in the system. McCoy made a cup of coffee, then nervously sat at his desk and opened the message. He wasn’t sure he could take another surprise. The familiar header made him numb all over again:

_From: Pike, C. [Admiral]_ {Flag: Deceased}  
_To: McCoy, L. [CMO: USS Enterprise]_

_So now you know. I damn well hope it was important enough to find out, Leonard. I’d put flags in the system hoping to step in in-person if you started looking, but if you’re getting this, well, I guess it’s impossible. I’d intended to tell him myself. I keep thinking that just waiting until he’s a little older would be a good idea. Until he’s matured into the captain he’d going to be. Outlived the shadow of George Kirk and can be confident that he’s earned every single thing he’s achieved._

It was Pike’s voice, clearly, a dictation rather than something that had been composed as text.

_It was a hard road for him, and I didn’t get the feeling there would be people at home looking after him. You’re his Bones, son, and he relies on you as surely as if you were holding him upright from the inside. Look after him now._

There was another image under the text: it appeared to have been taken in the medical bay of a starship. Pike, wearing command-track yellows and lieutenant’s stripes, sitting on a bed with the back raised. Jim was there too, clean this time with what looked like recently trimmed hair. The boy was being held tucked under Pike’s chin, hand fisted in the fabric of the man’s shirt. 

Jim’s eyes were closed and he might have been asleep. Pike looked weary, but happy. There was a tray on the bedside table, with what looked like a few bites of mashed potatoes missing.

The longer he looked at the image, the more McCoy’s emotions shifted to anger. Anger at Jim’s parents for shipping away a lonely boy, anger at Kodos and the whole godforsaken colony, anger at nurses who didn’t watch young charges as closely as they should, and anger at Khan for depriving Jim of what could have become a point of stability in his adult life.

Anger at what it might have meant for Jim to know while Pike was still alive. McCoy’s knuckles itched and he wished he’d got a good few punches in himself. Wished he could send Spock to slug the bastard all over again.

Jim slept most of the day away, which was probably a good thing. M’Benga had ducked his head in after lunch and been pleased by the update, no details of Tarsus provided; happy to back-up McCoy’s suggested course of action and tentatively re-schedule physiotherapy for the following day. 

They’d done a nutrient IV around mid-afternoon, but Jim was looking more alert by the evening so McCoy carefully asked, “Do you want me to call Spock?”

One corner of Jim’s mouth twisted. “I can’t have Spock come over every time I need to eat.” Taking a breath, he asked, “Can… can you take out the tube and let me try normally?”

McCoy didn’t know whether that was a good idea, or the worst suggestion he’d ever heard. Gently, he started, “There’s no sense trying to run before you can walk…” Jim’s lips thinned and McCoy trailed off, emotionally compromised indeed. Thinking back to the picture from Pike, he got an absolutely preposterous idea. He just about dismissed it, immediately, but if it worked… Against his better judgement, he said, “Fine, but you have to do it my way.”

Jim nodded, cautiously, knowing there had to be a catch. There was always a catch. 

“Okay.” Setting to work, McCoy fell into the routine of removing the tube, relieved when Jim seemed to take it well. Remembering what had been on the menu in the cafeteria, he asked for a nurse to bring up a small cup of butternut squash soup. It had been fairly bland, yet tasty. Obviously made from real vegetables rather than anything resequenced. 

Setting the cup on the table, he raised the head of the bed and tried not to lose his nerve as he said, “Okay, Jim. I just need you to slide forwards a bit.” He had to help the captain move, deliberately ignoring the incomprehension that followed when the other man found himself slumping lower as a result. 

Briskly, before Jim could say a word, McCoy kicked off his boots and tipped the captain forwards so he could slip between the head of the bed and the other man’s back. With his knees on either side, McCoy pulled Jim back against his chest. The action was met with a hitched breath of surprise, and what would have been a sudden movement if Jim had been able to turn.

“Bones?” Spooked was the only word that could describe how Jim sounded, and McCoy was suddenly glad he didn’t have to look him in the face as he explained.

“Shhh.” McCoy gave Jim’s shoulder an approximation of one of their usual friendly squeezes, “Don’t think about it, just feel safe. Okay?”

Feel safe? This was beyond weird, but Jim forced himself to set aside his surprise and just experience the sensation. Bones’ torso was lean and firm. Strong. He smelled of familiar aftershave and clean laundry and conveyed a clear sense of trust that went back _years_. The sweater McCoy was wearing sparked a memory as well, and he murmured, “You’re soft, Bones.” The doctor’s chuckle rumbled against his back and, suddenly, Jim thought he could actually do this.

As if sensing the change, McCoy held up the cup and tilted it invitingly. 

Leaning forwards, Jim closed his lips on the rim and, when McCoy tilted it further, sipped. As soon as his mouth filled his throat seemed to close. A kernel of panic lodged somewhere under his ribs and threatened to grow, but Jim forced himself to take a quick breath through his nose, then swallow. Before he could think, he took another sip, then another. Somehow, he managed half the cup before his stomach clenched warningly and he pulled away, back into the comforting presence that was Bones.

As Jim settled back against his chest McCoy felt something give a flip in his insides. They’d shared tents on survival training, seen each other naked under more circumstances than he cared to remember, clapped each other on the back and hugged and one night during the academy Jim had even sloppily kissed him while _spectacularly_ drunk as a way of making a point to someone who had been in the bar with them, but whose name he couldn’t remember. He’d patched Jim up after a fight or an away mission gone wrong, and dragged him home, and spoon fed him when that rash had come up over his hands on Orion III, and again when he’d had the Terellian shakes.

But they didn’t do this kind of touching. Whatever this was. 

Jim had turned his head sideways and closed his eyes, obviously concentrating on not being ill. He was breathing harshly through his nose, but seemed to be taking comfort from burrowing the side of his head against the doctor’s collarbone, drawing from the familiar texture and scent to ground himself in the present instead of the past.

McCoy’s hand twitched with the unexpected temptation to reach up and wrap an arm around Jim’s midsection, but he forced himself to keep it lax at his side. 

After a long minute, where Jim didn’t move but the soup seemed to be staying down, McCoy let his chin settle on the top of the other man’s head. Finally, three weeks after Jim’s death, he felt himself relax as well.


	7. Liberties

Pressure. A crick in his neck and a heavy weight against his chest; hips aching from too long in one position. It was a strange catalogue of sensation as he swam back to consciousness. McCoy woke up to find Jim snoring softly, body entirely lax in restful sleep. His own left arm was wrapped low around the other man’s belly. 

Oh. That hadn’t been McCoy’s intent at all, but as he shifted in an effort to alleviate the stiffness in his limbs he was forced to admit that Jim’s solid warmth felt surprisingly comforting. Perhaps it was what they both had needed. 

Awake, he wasn’t sure what to do. Twisting to get a glimpse of the chrono, McCoy froze in surprise to find a padd on the bedside table. It wasn’t his. M’Benga? No, this looked like the standard loaner model that visiting physicians could collect from reception. Something chilled in his insides: what if one of Raske’s people had caught him like this? He’d had a decent reason to climb onto the bed, but it wouldn’t look good for either of them. And Raske could make it look considerably worse.

He could have reached the padd without moving, but prefered to be on his feet if it was bad news. Cursing himself for the simple miscalculation of not locking the door, McCoy gently extricated himself from the bed, relieved when Jim stirred but didn’t wake despite being jostled.

Picking up the pad, gingerly, he powered it on and frowned when the screen displayed a list of bookmarked papers related to neural grafting. They looked… interesting… and were all clearly related to his own work. Had it been left for him intentionally? From Spock, perhaps? Going more carefully through the list he wasn’t so sure: a few of the papers were conference proceedings, which rendered them fairly obscure outside of the medical profession.

Glancing around the room in confusion revealed another surprise: the door was locked. Someone had come in, left the padd within reach, and locked the door when they left. Perhaps it had been M’Benga after all, which was embarrassing but not the end of the world. 

Searching for more clues, McCoy poked his head into the hallway just in time to spot M’Benga exit the lift at the far end and come towards him. Relieved, he quickly stepped out of the room and motioned towards his office. 

McCoy expected the other doctor to mention the padd in his hand, instead, M’Benga tugged to loosen the collar of his uniform and sank into the offered chair, “Jeez, Len, it’s crazy out there. I got stuck for over an hour as they were lifting part of the saucer section.”

It didn’t take much turning of gears for McCoy to realize M’Benga couldn’t possibly be responsible for the padd.

Not catching McCoy’s surprise, the doctor carried on, “We got a memo this afternoon asking us to review beds. When that damn ship came down the local hospitals overloaded and they had to push trauma cases elsewhere, some even internationally. We’re trying to make space to bring cases closer to home.”

McCoy nodded along, distracted and not quite making the connection until M’Benga said, “I was wondering if you had an idea when we could consider moving the captain?”

Snapping back to the present, McCoy stumbled over the question, “I’m sorry?”

“Kirk: he seems to be turning the corner so far as eating is concerned and if that’s the case he just needs muscle rehab and observation. We could shift him to a rehab facility in another city,” M’Benga watched the other man’s reactions closely, “or I’d be willing to clear him to go home, if he’d be staying with you.”

Home. The empty room with Jim’s leather jacket waiting on the bed. He thought of someone catching them together that afternoon and flushed; Jim sleeping tucked under McCoy’s chin. He was still feeling discombobulated by it, and wasn’t even sure why. That remembered urge to bring an arm up and around Jim’s midsection made him flex a hand and clench it into a fist. Trying to keep his tone light, he said, “Jim managed to take some soup, but it wasn’t easy; his stomach is still really bothering him and I don’t want to think what his lower GI tract is going to be like.”

“I was going to fix him with a temp-ostomy unit. I assumed it’s what he’d prefer until he can get himself to the bathroom.”

“Yeah.” McCoy couldn’t imagine Jim Kirk ever willingly using a bedpan, that was for sure. “You’re probably right about that.” That would be one thing he wouldn’t have to deal with, at least. M’Benga was right: all Jim really needed now was to keep eating, have regular muscle regen, and outpatient rehab that could probably be done at the apartment at first. Hell, he could probably manage most of that himself. Remembering the past three weeks, though, he bit the inside of his cheek. 

Sensing that there was some sort of conflict, M’Benga patted McCoy on the shoulder and stood, “We could use the bed, Leonard. Think about it, okay?”

Alone, McCoy turned the padd over in his hands, unsure why he’d hesitated when being offered what he’d spent the last three weeks wanting. What they were threatening to take his medical license away for, because he didn’t think he’d heard the last from Raske. It was seven o’clock, Jim was still sleeping, and McCoy’s own stomach was reminding him he needed to eat as well. Setting aside the decision for the next day, he pulled on his jacket and headed for a nearby bar frequented by fleet medical personnel.

A burger did wonders for making him feel more human again. Swiping a fry through a pool of ketchup, he scrolled through one of the articles on the mysterious padd and tried to relax. There was a comforting hum of activity in the bar; the kind of thing that could be tuned out, yet still providing a background of real people.

“I hear you’re emotionally compromised. How’s that going?”

McCoy’s head snapped up so hard he nearly strained his neck. Philip Boyce: in civilian clothing, no less. He’d been listed as Jim’s attending until McCoy and M’Benga were cleared and transferred into the Earthside system. The older man sank into the chair opposite McCoy without waiting for an invitation and placed two full glasses on the table.

At McCoy’s raised eyebrow, Boyce shrugged. "Sometimes a man'll tell his bartender things he'll never tell his doctor." 

It was a strange remark, but not one to dissuade McCoy from accepting a free drink. 

They clinked glasses, although it was unclear to what end. McCoy took a sip of his drink, and damn it was good, only to narrowly avoid spewing it over the table as Boyce casually said, “I gather you’ve seen my photos.”

“ _Your_ photos?”

Boyce rolled his eyes, but good naturedly, “What? You thought Chris took them of himself.”

McCoy’s eyebrow was making a concerted break for his hairline. “I thought they were pulled from an official record.”

“More or less, but I was on the Aldrin with Chris; we served together before I ever became his CMO.” Boyce took a sip of his drink as McCoy digested the information, then added, “It was a hell of a thing getting a message from a dead man.”

“You too?”

“Oh yeah.” Boyce’s gaze briefly shuttered, “Trust Chris to get the last word.” He took a sip of his drink that was more of a gulp and grimaced.

McCoy had no idea how to respond, so he sipped his own drink and waited for the other man to say something.

Eventually, Boyce continued, “You should have heard him the night before Kirk enlisted. He called me, furious, ‘Guess who I just scraped off the ground after a bar fight.’ He’d always hoped things would go better for James once he got back to Earth and was pretty pissed when it looked like Starfleet had just abandoned him. It wasn’t his place to do anything once the kid had been returned to his family, and all the records of minors are sealed, but he always wondered.”

The hot anger from earlier curled in McCoy’s belly again and he couldn’t hold back from saying, low and just barely evenly, “Why didn’t he tell him? Do you have any idea what that would have meant? Jim said when Pike held him back then it felt like having a father.”

“Jim had a father. He died.”

McCoy’s hand clenched into a tight fist, and there was a sting of pain where nails dug into his palm. “Dammit, Pike was _alive_ , and cared a hell of a lot more than anyone else had.”

“And Chris told you the truth: Jim had enough self doubt and accusations of nepotism on his plate without having to think it might actually be the case. He needed to know he could find his own way.”

McCoy snorted, “James T Kirk’s overinflated ego was legendary in our cohort.”

Boyce merely gave a look over the rim of his glass that conveyed what he thought of that statement.

Fine, McCoy knew better as well. Jim may claim he joined Starfleet on a dare, but the truth was he’d been hovering around the fringes of the shipyards for months before the fateful fight, resisting a pull he didn’t quite understand. And from the moment he’d decided to set foot in that shuttle, he’d been trying to live up to the memory of George Kirk. Sometimes McCoy wondered if he even knew what it meant to be Jim. 

McCoy didn’t like the explanation, but he grudgingly had to admit that he understood it. Turning his glass slowly in his hand, he scraped the heavy bottom over the wooden tabletop, tracing a circle with drips of condensation. With a finger he added spikes, a child’s rendering of a sun.

Softly, Boyce turned his own glass and said, “Chris considered resigning, once, after he’d lost people. Don’t let Jim convince himself to do something stupid like that.”

McCoy nodded, even as he felt utterly overwhelmed at the impossibility of making such a promise. He remembered Jim’s gasped: fifteen _thousand_ , and swiped the end of the glass over the moisture, obliterating the sun and leaving a wet smudge.

“It’s a damned crazy thing, son, being the doctor of a man you love.” Boyce took a sip of his drink and admitted, softly, “Sometimes you just have to put them back together in the med bay, then bring them back to life at home.”

Love. McCoy’s gaze flicked upwards in surprise, reading the simple truth on the other man’s face. He’d never known Pike had anyone. Licking his lips, he said, “We’re not…”

Boyce smiled, wanly, at the objection. “Leonard, we both know that doesn’t matter.”

McCoy’s gaze drifted back down to the table, following the lines and swirls in the grain of the wood. 

“You can call yourself emotionally compromised all you want, but you’re still what he needs. And I think you need him too.”

Remembering rough, anonymous hands several days before, McCoy’s cheeks pinked.

Boyce took one last gulp and finished his drink, then stood and clapped a hand on the other doctor’s shoulder. “Trust your judgement.” He gave a firm squeeze and added, “Consult with M’Benga when you need to, and I’ll get added to Jim’s file as a secondary physician. I catch you _thinking_ of doing anything boneheaded and I’ll call you on it.”

And then he was gone, and McCoy was left wondering what the hell had just happened.

**********

They brought Jim home early the next morning. 

Never a natural morning person, McCoy had nonetheless been up for two hours by the time porters arrived with monitoring equipment, medical supplies, exercise equipment and, finally, Jim himself propped up in a wheelchair.

The way Jim’s eyes lit up when he saw the apartment made McCoy suddenly more hopeful that he’d done the right thing. By the time they got Jim settled into the corner bedroom there was a tiredness to his smile, despite the early morning, but he looked out the windows with undisguised interest. 

It was a clear sunny day, and sailboats were tacking back and forth in the breeze. McCoy breathed another silent thanks to Spock for arranging a view that didn’t include any of the devastation or activity related to the Vengeance. A physiotherapist was coming at eleven, so Jim took a nap while McCoy fussed around with the equipment until it was set up to his specifications. 

McCoy stayed away during the therapy session, then made lunch as a peace offering given that Jim was bound to be frustrated by his slow progress. Opening the door with his shoulder, he carried in a mug of soup and some bread Jim didn’t have to know was fortified with added nutrients and fibre within an inch of its life.

The head of the bed was raised and Jim, looking slightly sweaty, smiled weakly when McCoy entered. Sure enough, the little vein that had a tendency to throb when Jim was frustrated was making itself known. 

Impulsively, McCoy reached out and smoothed a hand over Jim’s forehead, brushing sweaty hair back and running a thumb over the troublesome vein. He did it without thought or comment, and if Jim found it surprising the captain didn’t let on. Sinking into the beside chair, McCoy help up the mug: “It’s soup and bread-- do you want it from a spoon or the cup?” 

Jim’s mouth twisted in a way that suggested he was going to make some hare-brained suggestion about feeding himself, so McCoy raised an eyebrow in warning. With a roll of his eyes, Jim said, “Cup.”

“Cup it is.” Considering the logistics for a moment, McCoy moved to perch beside Jim on the head of the bed, then held up the lukewarm soup. Carefully, Jim leaned forward and sipped while McCoy let himself prattle on about the view and the weather, keeping up a continuous distraction until the other man pulled back and twisted to lean his forehead against McCoy’s shoulder. 

The pause was shorter this time, just a few harsh breaths through his nose, then Jim turned back to the mug and managed to finish it before repeating the procedure.

McCoy simply ignored it, reminding Jim of their PT runs through Golden Gate Park and speculating as to whether Spock would take advantage of the down time to visit _Older_ Spock on New Vulcan.

Eventually, Jim raised his head again and offered a smile, “Thanks.”

“Hey, there’s bread too.” He tore off a bite sized piece and proffered it invitingly. “The sooner you’re back on solids the sooner I’ll give you some real choice in your menu.”

Jim rolled his eyes, but took the bite, ultimately managing to eat the whole piece a morsel at a time while McCoy attempted to ignore the feeling of Jim’s lips brushing against his fingers. 

Finally, lunch was over and after sweeping away the crumbs McCoy regarded his patient with a critical eye. The physical therapy had taken almost an hour, and despite his weakness Jim had clearly thrown himself into it. On a hunch, he asked, “Sore?” The half second pause told him more than any verbal answer and he moved to get a hypo.

“Wait.” Clearly unsure about something, Jim pursed his lips, then asked, “Can I try without it? I’m so tired of feeling drugged all the time.”

McCoy’s eyes narrowed. “One to ten?”

“Six.” Jim’s throat worked as he swallowed, then admitted, “They were just aching at first, but now some of the muscles are spasming.

“Christ, Jim. You should have said something.”

“He warned me it could be painful with the regenerated tissue and there might be spasms.” The therapist had said that it wasn’t a cause for concern, but something to be managed, “I’m just so tired of all the drugs.” Grumpiness turned into defeat as Jim’s gaze slithered down to the blanket, “I’m tired of being tired!”

Feeling himself capitulating, McCoy tapped his fingers against his thigh as he considered. Coming to a decision, he pressed the control to recline the head of the bed and pulled back the blankets to reveal Jim’s medical issue pyjamas. 

Lookup up, confusion added to the pained furrow in Jim’s forehead. “What are you doing?”

Gruffly, McCoy said, “What doctors used to do before we had a galaxy of hypos at our disposal.” And with that he reached out and took a firm hold on one tense, trembling calf. Jim’s look of surprise melted into what, under normal circumstances, would have been an embarrassingly guttural moan as McCoy’s fingers dug in and manipulated, easing the spasm and taking the worst of the pain with it. “That help?”

Jim muttered something that sounded like, “Oh my God, Bones,” and McCoy smirked. A surgeon’s hands could do more than just wield a laser scalpel. It helped that a ship’s doctor had to be ready to manage every stage of the healing process as well. 

Moving from one calf to the other, then up Jim’s legs, arms, shoulders... McCoy methodically eased and soothed the muscles, and damned if the therapist hadn’t done a number on him. I was what Jim needed, but wasn’t going to be any fun for the foreseeable future.

Focused on the task, quite literally, at hand, McCoy allowed himself a smile at Jim’s nonsensical, yet clearly pleasurable, murmurings. Eventually, McCoy’s hands tired as well, and he finished with a gentle pressure on the other man’s shoulders before pulling away.

Jim appeared more relaxed... yet oddly flushed.

Oh. Glancing down again confirmed it. _Oh_. 

McCoy cringed: looked like the massage had been a little too enjoyable. Not his intent at all. He could offer him some privacy, but given Jim’s strength and coordination at the moment that was likely to be more frustrating than fruitful. The things they didn’t teach you in med school. God, maybe nursing school was different; this was exactly the kind of situation most doctors would simply wash their hands of and leave to someone lower on the totem pole.

“Jim, I’ll just go and clear up the kitchen, or I can give you a hypo…” 

The other man flushed even more and without raising his eyes confirmed the suspicion that had made McCoy trail off, “It’s not exactly the first time in the last couple days.”

Lord. 

It wasn’t likely to be the last time either. At least there were a few mild drugs with appropriate side effects, but he wasn’t willing to dose Jim needlessly more than once or twice. Loading a hypo, he flushed in mutual embarrassment as he touched it to Jim’s neck. 

It was hard to say who was more relieved to discover it had a rapid effect.

Tucking the blanket back around Jim and raising the head of the bed, McCoy slumped back into the bedside chair and pulled up a football game recorded the day before. Seizing on the distraction, they both jumped into their usual football banter: taking opposite sides, criticising the calls and plays. The rest of the day passed easily: Jim took a nap, they watched another game, ate dinner, then pecked away at their own padds in companionable silence. 

In bed that night, McCoy found himself remembering similar afternoons in the academy. Afternoons on Enterprise, or what they called an afternoon when it coincided with a rare chance at real downtime, never felt so relaxed. Ship’s business always tended to intrude; an inescapable part of the responsibility of a captain and chief medical officer. Even shore leave tended to have a need to not go too far; to be able to be recalled just in case. It had been years since they’d been able to just… be.

Rolling over and stretching, McCoy felt some of the tension bleed out of his shoulders. It wasn’t completely gone, between the inquiry and the last three weeks there was still too much hanging over him. Wondering if he’d ever feel normal again, he slipped off to sleep.

The next morning went more smoothly: McCoy immediately joined Jim after the therapist left, bearing a hypo to help him relax and hands at the ready to ease the captain’s muscles. He spent an hour methodically rubbing and massaging, surprised to find how well he knew Jim’s body. The leg he’d set after a misadventure during what was supposed to be a diplomatic summit, frequently bruised and skinned knuckles, cracked and sometimes broken ribs, the arm that had been broken in a run-in with a Gorn, a collarbone that lost an argument with a shuttle… countless injuries, minor and major. McCoy felt as if he was easing all those remembered pains as well. 

Eventually, McCoy realized he’d been working for an hour, and that Jim had been growing increasingly lax under his aching hands. Pausing, a quick check revealed that the captain had fallen asleep. Smiling, he pulled the blanket back into place and left to work in his own office. 

It all fell apart three hours later when McCoy went to check on Jim and found the other man clumsily palming himself under the blanket. It was clearly not getting him anywhere and as McCoy stood, unobserved, in the doorway Jim gave a groan that was pure frustration rather than pleasure. Jim was flushed, vein hammering in his forehead, sweating, and unable to manage the simple effort and coordination to bring himself to completion.

McCoy remembered Boyce’s words: “Sometimes you just have to put them back together in the med bay, then bring them back to life at home.” It was almost a benediction, but he didn’t think what he was considering was _remotely_ what Boyce had in mind. It was wrong. It was the kind of thing they definitely revoked your medical license for, but jesus fucking christ what the hell was he supposed to do?

Jim was going to kick him out, demand to go back to the medical center, never look at him again _and_ take his medical license, yet in an almost out of body experience McCoy heard himself say, “Do you want a hand?” 

Jim’s head snapped towards the door. “A _hand_?” The word came out in a strangled squeak.

McCoy winced, and was about to blurt out that he’d been joking; to forget it; anything to recall the words.

But before he could say anything, Jim breathed out in a rush, “Fuck, Bones. Would you?”

Everything about this was spectacularly wrong, but Jim was blinking up at him, flushed, not quite meeting his eyes but obviously willing. McCoy kicked off his shoes and, before he lost his nerve, clambered up behind the other man on the bed. It was a parody of their posture when McCoy was feeding him two days before. There was a small bottle of massage oil he’d brought earlier, but not used, on the bedside table. Well, he thought, guess it’s going to get opened after all. 

Tugging the pyjamas aside, he reached around to take Jim in hand and whispered, “Pretend it’s those twins with the tails you told me about.” There was a surge of hot flesh under his hand and McCoy smirked, despite himself. 

It didn’t last long. 

Jim’s head twisted from side to side on McCoy’s chest and he made several guttural noises deep in his throat, before burying his mouth against his own shoulder and muffling a long, shuddering moan.

McCoy couldn’t quite believe what he’d done, even though the proof was all over his hand. In the sudden silence, he could hear his own heart pounding and was sure Jim could feel it as well. A minute stretched into two, and still nobody moved. Steeling himself for what would come next, McCoy forced himself to break the silence. In a voice that didn’t quite sound like his own, he said, “You okay?”

The only response from the other man was a mumbled, “Thanks, Bones,” as Jim drifted off to sleep before McCoy could extricate himself from the bed.

 _Wonderful_. Rolling his eyes, McCoy struggled out from behind the other man while trying to avoid making a mess. Jim didn’t stir as the doctor returned and quickly cleaned him off, making sure the ostomy unit hadn’t been unseated during the activity. Looking down, McCoy felt something twitch in his chest at the sight of Jim sleeping with a trace of a smile on his face.

Grumbling, but without any venom in the words, McCoy shook his head. “Trust you to like my technique, you horny bastard.”

If he was perfectly honest, he was feeling rather unsettled. McCoy forced himself into a cold shower and resisted the urge to jerk off as well; so long as he didn’t gain any pleasure he could try to tell himself he hadn’t just committed a massive violation of doctor-patient trust. Try being the operative word. It didn’t make him feel any better when, teeth chattering, he finally shut off the water. Raske was definitely going to have his medical license, and at this rate he’d deserve it.

It should have been awkward. Tremendously, unspeakably awkward.

It wasn’t.

Jim woke up around dinnertime and called for a padd. When McCoy brought it the other man smiled as if nothing had happened and asked after the doctor’s afternoon. Tentatively, McCoy settled into the chair and explained the article he was still working on, wondering when Jim was planning to bring up the elephant in the room. A half hour later it became clear he simply… wasn’t. The conversation moved on: Jim picked up the previous speculation about whether Spock was planning a visit to New Vulcan, inquired after the rest of the bridge crew, even expressed some cautious interest in how the work clearing the city was progressing.

They ate dinner, then watched a film that Chekov had recommended weeks ago. It was good, but the romantic sub-plot probably appealed more to a slightly younger audience. Afterwards, it was late enough that McCoy helped Jim get settled for sleep and said a good night. 

He was halfway into the living room when Jim’s voice stopped him. “Uh, Bones?” When McCoy turned in the doorway, Jim offered a lopsided smile. “Thanks. For earlier.”

McCoy’s eyebrow crawled upwards, but he kept his voice even as he replied, “Sure, Jim.” 

Collapsing into his own bed an hour later, McCoy settled into a restless sleep, waking every hour until dawn. The dreams kept following a swirling pattern: his medical license being revoked; Jim, lifeless in a body bag that seemed to unzip endlessly; young ensigns with staring, dead eyes torn almost in half by flying debris; his father, asking to die; all of the people he couldn’t save; and Jim’s voice, rough in his ear, “Fuck, Bones.”


	8. Disclosures

The next morning it was more of the same: Jim interacting as if nothing had happened and McCoy feeling persistently wrongfooted. After a breakfast where Jim managed to clumsily feed himself, the doctor doggedly kept up the other side of a benign conversation that left him feeling almost dazed by its normality. By the time the physiotherapist arrived he felt a wave of relief at the opportunity to hide in his office.

Jim must compartmentalize, McCoy realized, as he tried and failed to get some work done. Sex was just a pleasure to be experienced and not a person to grow closer to or be discarded. Anyone who slept his way through the academy without getting attached had to be able to do that. 

McCoy, in contrast, had always been utter shit at stuff like that. He remembered a satiated mumble against his ear, “Thanks, Bones,” and stumbled over the sentence he was trying to compose on his padd. The apartment was suddenly suffocating and he ran a finger under his collar and tugged, as if the gesture could provide some relief. It didn’t. 

He tossed his stylus onto the desk in disgust and considered his options. The therapist was with Jim; McCoy’s services were unlikely to be needed that day as they were trying to see how the captain would do in a wheelchair. 

Abandoning his padd, McCoy pulled on his running shoes instead. 

It was a crisp fall day. Overcast, yet bright; a swift breeze making it colder than initial appearances suggested. McCoy started towards Golden Gate Park, kicking up his feet and running through the initial burn of pain and gasping for breath until a comforting rush of endorphins washed over him and he felt like he could run forever. The confused weather matched his mood, so McCoy ran on through to the far side of the park, then turned towards the ocean. Six kilometers, seven, eight, nine and he was running along the beach, stumbling in the sand and narrowly avoiding a twisted ankle. Ignoring the near injury, he kept going. The rugged expanse of Land’s End was largely empty of people and McCoy made himself keep running even as his muscles and tendons painfully protested again. The breeze from the ocean was crisp and fresh; he let the Pacific fill his senses until he couldn’t think of anything at all. Eleven kilometers and he was climbing now, back towards the Presidio, slowing to something only generously described as a jog as he went. A band had settled across his chest that was tightening, as if he couldn’t manage to take in quite enough oxygen. Twelve kilometers and grey spots sparked at the edge of his vision and he stumbled, but he kept moving. Thirteen, fourteen and he could feel his pace markedly slowing further still, whether from exhaustion or the hill it was hard to tell. Instead of turning towards the apartment, he passed a direct route and carried on towards the foot of the bridge.

McCoy wasn’t running anymore. At best, it was a shuffling sort of jog, no faster than a brisk walk, but he kept going… he couldn’t remember the last time he’d made himself run this far. Years ago, most likely, when Jim had some damn fool idea about entering a half marathon together as training for the heavy costume he’d dreamt up for the Bay to Breakers. Jim. Something twinged in his chest that wasn’t entirely due to exertion and he forced himself to carry on. The devastated skyline came into view, with automated cleanup modules still swarming above. McCoy ducked his head and doubled back, pace slowing to a dogged shuffle that was barely more than a walk. 

The apartment building finally came into view and McCoy had to use the railing to pull himself up a set of front steps. By the time he was hobbling down the hall reality started to reassert itself again. What the hell had he been thinking? It was a feeling that only increased when he opened the front door and was greeted by name.

“Bones?” 

Jim. In a wheelchair, no less. McCoy blinked, but the scene didn’t change. 

The captain was watching the doctor with a quizzical look on his face. Upright, yet carefully supported in the chair, he was situated in the living room with a view of the ocean.

McCoy frowned and tried to guess how long he’d been gone. Long, was all he could come up with. 

Jim looked tired; he’d probably not expected to be left sitting for that length of time.

Guilt twisted in McCoy’s gut and he limped forwards, the mask of _doctor_ settling onto his face. “Dammit, Jim. How long did that idiot leave you out here? You should be in bed.”

Jim managed to wave a hand in a vaguely dismissive gesture, even though his complexion was decidedly waxen.

McCoy ignored it, as he always did, snatching up a wrist like his great-grandfather would have done and running another hand over Jim’s forehead. If the other man leaned into the touch the doctor ignored it in favor of focusing on the signs of life under his hands. A steady, even pulse and warm, slightly clammy forehead. “I think you’re fine, but let’s get you back to bed.” 

That Jim didn’t protest worried him and McCoy nearly forgot about the pain in his legs as he wheeled the chair back into the bedroom. In a practiced movement, he transferred the other man back into the bed, only relaxing when the monitors confirmed what he’d felt earlier: Jim was fine, albeit a bit tired.

McCoy felt tension drain from his shoulders at the readings. He looked up from the hand scanner to find he was under close scrutiny.

“Are you okay, Bones?”

Distractedly, McCoy ran another scan as he said, “I’m fine, Jim. Just a bit footsore, but nothing a few minutes of regen won’t fix.”

Jim’s lips thinned in a way that indicated he hadn’t been asking about McCoy’s feet. 

Now that he’d mentioned it, McCoy’s feet were _killing_ him and he was suddenly aware of the fact that his shirt was damp with sweat. Closing his eyes for a moment to hide from Jim’s gaze, he took a deep breath and huffed, “I need a shower.” Without waiting for a reply, he turned and limped out of the room. Jim let him go.

After a shower, it took more than a few minutes under the regen to heal the newly torn skin on McCoy’s feet. One toenail looked like a close call: it had obviously been slowly battered against the tip of his shoe and any longer could have made it fall off out of spite. A painkiller and an anti-inflammatory were also necessary before he managed to shuffle into his jeans. It was an hour before he felt human again, but a weak, wrung-out version of one. 

The fridge was empty, and it made for a welcome distraction. Scowling at the shelves for a moment, McCoy closed the door just a little too firmly. Poking his head into Jim’s room, he found the other man still awake. “Hey. Cupboard is bare. I need to go out and get some provisions.” It was a thin excuse and he knew it, as did Jim; it would have been easier to order a delivery.

There was something unsettling in the way Jim was watching him. Trying to be casual, McCoy set down his padd and ran one last vital scan to ease his mind. The results were normal, or what passed as normal for Jim these days.

“I’m fine, Bones.” There was something weary in Jim’s voice. “Honestly. You weren’t gone that long.” It wasn’t true, but it was a fiction they were both willing to entertain.

McCoy smiled, but it didn’t quite meet his eyes. “I’ll be back soon.”

The shopping trip stretched to almost two hours.

By the time McCoy struggled through the front door with an armful of groceries the desire to escape the apartment had been replaced by a hot embarrassment for ever having felt that way. He put away the food, then wandered into Jim’s bedroom.

Surprisingly, the other man was awake, despite not having called out when McCoy was clattering in the kitchen. There was an expression on the captain’s face that the doctor couldn’t read, beyond knowing it was not good. Was this it, then?

McCoy’s stomach twisted into a hard knot and he waited.

When Jim did speak, it was not what McCoy had expected to hear: “You left your padd unlocked.”

“Oh?”

There was a hardness to Jim’s gaze that McCoy couldn’t remember being directed at him before. “I got bored when you were out and was looking at the news.” 

Jim’s padd had been blocking most things that could have been even remotely considered stressful, but it was about time to lift that particular prohibition anyway.

Continuing, Jim said, “You got a couple messages.”

Pointedly, McCoy frowned. He didn’t like the direction this was going and decided for the direct approach, “You mean you saw my messages.”

Jim flushed, but appeared unlikely to drop it. “Philip Boyce sent you a paper on some neurosurgical procedure I can’t pronounce.”

 _Phil_. McCoy felt a wave of relief at the confirmation that the other doctor must have been responsible for the mysterious padd. It was short lived when Jim added, “You also got a priority message from Starfleet.”

The knot in his belly twisted more tightly. Licking his lips, McCoy asked, softly, “Which branch?”

Anger flashed in Jim’s eyes as he held out the padd, hand trembling slightly at the effort. “What the hell is this, Bones?”

Taking the padd, McCoy thumbed on the screen to find the most recent message already pulled up:

_From: Starfleet Medical: Ethics and Disciplinary Board_  
_To: McCoy, L. [CMO: USS Enterprise]_  
_Copy: Chandra, N. [Admiral]; Lui, G. [Admiral] Raske, A. [Admiral]_  
_Subject: Communication of disciplinary ruling: McCoy, L. H._  
_Read receipt: Enabled_  
_  
Following your testimony to Admirals Chandra, Lui, Archer, and myself your actions were referred for confidential internal review. Given the seriousness of this matter, there was considerable discussion of both your future in Starfleet and fitness to hold a medical license. While we cannot condone your actions, we have determined that a public prosecution would not serve the best interests of Starfleet at this time. Please note: this was not a unanimous decision, and I can not underemphasize the seriousness of our consideration of suspension or revocation of your license to practise medicine._

_The board ruling consists of one (1) action to consider this matter closed:_

_1\. Demotion to the rank of lieutenant for a probationary period of six (6) months, after which good standing will result in the resumption of the rank of lieutenant commander. Any further lapse in good judgement may result in this demotion becoming permanent, with immediate reconsideration of your role as Chief Medical Officer, USS Enterprise._

_Admiral Andrew Raske_  
_Chief of Starfleet Medical_  


Anger and relief hit McCoy with such force he felt a prickling of tears behind his eyes and had to close them before he embarrassed himself. A six month demotion. Embarrassing, but he could live with that. Could _easily_ live with that as the price of having Jim here with him. Archer and Phlox must have continued to lobby for him. Eyes still closed, he felt suddenly lightheaded as he mumbled, “Oh thank God.”

From what seemed like far away, he heard Jim’s indignant voice exclaim, “You’re okay with this?”

The lightheadedness only increased and he had to sit down, heavily, on the side of the bed. When that didn’t help much he folded over, dropping his head between his knees and trying to take gulps of the suddenly rarefied air. They had tried to take away his medical license. He didn’t know what it meant to be Leonard without being Doctor McCoy.

“Bones?” Jim’s voice still sounded far away and he could only make a choked noise in the back of his throat in reply.

A hand settled on his back, weakly stroking, and McCoy felt himself break; overwhelmed by what he’d almost lost. He sniffed, wetly, and felt the hand manage a gentle squeeze in reply. A drop of moisture landed on the floor, then another. 

Jim gave another squeeze and murmured, “Come on, Bones.”

He didn’t know what was being suggested, perhaps Jim didn’t either, but it was suddenly unbearable to be hunched over. Alone. McCoy twisted, vision still grey, kicked up his feet and stretched out pressed against the other man’s side. Jim made a noise that could have been surprise, but McCoy ignored it in favor of burying his face in the crook of Jim’s neck and taking several shaky breaths.

McCoy could feel Jim’s pulse hammering against his cheek and mumbled, “I lost you.”

Jim’s right hand reached up and over to settle between McCoy’s shoulder blades as he said, “You brought me back.”

McCoy still felt as if he could be sick. “They tried to take away my medical license. I don’t know what I’d have done.” 

He felt Jim swallow, hard, before the captain said, “It’s okay, Bones. They didn’t.”

Jim smelled of sweat and antiseptic medical soap, nothing like his normal scent of aftershave and something inherently masculine, but he was still _Jim_. McCoy gave a chuckle that didn’t have a trace of mirth in it. “I’m emotionally compromised. Seems you leave a trail of that in your wake.”

Jim’s only response was to hold him a little more tightly.

Without the threat of eye contact, McCoy heard himself mumble, “I care about you Jim. I’m sorry. I don’t know how not to.”

The silence stretched, then, “I care about you too, Bones.”

“Not like this.”

Softly. So softly McCoy wasn’t even sure he’d heard the words, Jim said, “How do you know?”

He was going to pass out all over again. McCoy’s heart started pounding and he could barely breathe, but he forced himself to pull back enough to meet the other man’s gaze.

Holy shit. 

There was an emotion dancing in Jim’s blue eyes that McCoy had never seen before.

Jim smiled, lopsidedly, and managed to bring a hand up and run a knuckle along the side of McCoy’s face before having to drop it back to the blanket. “I guess I’m emotionally compromised too. Have been for a long time. Don’t tell Spock or he’ll steal my chair.”

McCoy’s mouth dropped open and he couldn’t, for the life of him, come up with a riposte.

With a passing frown of effort Jim managed to get a hand up to the back of McCoy’s neck to pull him down for a kiss.

 _Holy shit_.

McCoy was suddenly aware he’d spared more than a passing moment glancing at Jim’s lips over the years: smiling, laughing, drinking, teasing, but he’d never considered that they could feel remotely like this. 

Jim made a little noise in the back of his throat that McCoy decided he needed to hear again _right then_ so he broke free of his surprised paralysis, planted his arms on either side of Jim’s face and kissed him so soundly it was a wonder they managed to breathe at all. When McCoy finally pulled back slightly Jim was red faced and panting, his now longer-than-regulation hair dishevelled and blue eyes slightly dazed. 

Jim licked his lips, quirked an eyebrow and brought McCoy’s inner monologue to life: “Holy shit, Bones.”

McCoy just smiled, then leaned down and kissed him all over again.


	9. Home

It was easy. 

That surprised McCoy the most, although he couldn’t say why. It was totally, unfathomably easy to slip into a _relationship_ with James Kirk.

Even that first day, when all his fear and stress and confusion had been replaced by the glorious mess of sensations that was Jim. They’d kissed until they were dizzy and then kissed some more until finally McCoy’s head had slipped back down to tuck under Jim’s chin. It was there, where he could feel the other man’s pulse as a constant reminder that Jim was very much alive, that he realized what he’d been running from: he loved Jim Kirk. God help him. 

Jim’s arm was slung loosely over him and it gave a gentle squeeze. “Bones?”

He felt Jim swallow, so simply waited.

There was an unusual hesitation before Jim asked, “Why did you come with me?”

McCoy turned the question around in his mind, but it didn’t become more clear. “Where?” He could sense Jim tense, minutely, so he pulled back, propping himself up on an elbow to meet the other man’s gaze. A “nevermind” was clearly forming on Jim’s lips, which he attempted to forestall by repeating, “Where, Jim?”

Jim’s lip quirked into a self-conscious half smile as he quoted, “Space is disease and danger wrapped in darkness and silence.”

Oh. There. McCoy settled his head back on the other man’s chest and considered. The slim blue volume, tucked away in the other bedroom, came to mind, along with the first words that had caught his eye as he’d flipped through the initial pages in Pike’s office.

Turning slightly, not giving up his place on Jim’s chest yet ensuring his voice wouldn’t be muffled, McCoy said, “Pike gave me a fork in the road: they wanted me to be a surgery lead based in San Francisco. Even threw in a research chair to sweeten the deal. It was everything I thought I’d wanted when Starfleet offered me a way out of Georgia.” Jim tightened his grip, but otherwise waited. “Then Pike handed me your padd, and the book.” 

He took a breath, trying to figure out how to put what had happened into words, then continued, “I don’t where where you found it, but I flipped it open in Pike’s office and a passage caught my eye.” McCoy licked his lips, then softly quoted for Jim, “ _By the road to the contagious hospital; under the surge of the blue mottled clouds driven from the northeast—a cold wind_. He practiced medicine by day and wrote at night, and, Jesus, Jim, you could tell. You reminded me that _Earth_ can be danger and disease, and alone… I reckon the silence would have been deafening.”

McCoy shifted to lie fully on top of Jim, propping himself up on his elbows and pressing the length of their bodies together as he continued, skipping ahead: “ _They enter the new world naked, cold, uncertain of all save that they enter._ ”

McCoy rolled his hips, kindling a shock of pleasure between them as he met the other man’s eyes and said, “You got me, Jim. More than anyone ever had.”

And Jim smiled in a way that made his eyes _glow_ as he replied, “I love you too, Bones.”

Too easy.

Right up until the moment McCoy returned from shopping two weeks later and found the apartment empty.

A quick inspection revealed that the powered wheelchair was missing as well and McCoy ran a hand over his face: the fucker had escaped. It looked like he’d at least taken a comm with him, but when McCoy tried to call it the device simply pinged back an out of service message. What the hell-- tampering with the comm? McCoy was alternating between waiting for Jim to come back and then promptly strangling him or calling Spock and setting up a search, when he caught sight of the date on his own padd.

It was Thursday.

The Starfleet officers’ cemetery was closed to the public on Thursdays, with a dampening field that interfered with electronic devices. While the rules kept out public eyes, or photographers, there was an unspoken agreement in the ‘fleet that no one saw anything on Thursdays. No one saw Admiral Chandra every Thursday afternoon, when he came to talk with his wife. She’d gone down with her ship in the firefight above Vulcan. No one saw Ambassador Xo’thar when she visited Earth once a year to meditate on the memorial for her father; a decorated Starfleet admiral. No one saw Winona Kirk when she slipped into the graveyard around the Kelvin memorial day events, sometimes silent, sometimes smiling, wanly, as she spoke, sometimes directing tired, angry words at the marble memorial to her husband.

The anger melted away. He had a pretty good idea where Jim had gone; and it fortunately wasn’t far either. McCoy contemplated suiting up in his uniform, but it was Thursday so he simply pulled on his leather jacket instead.

The terraced hillside of memorials for officers who had died in service was both tucked away and in a prime location overlooking the ocean. 

It wasn’t a traditional cemetery, those had gone out of fashion centuries ago when space became tight, but it was a place for memory and contemplation. A gravel path ran down towards the distant ocean, through a series of white marble walls inscribed with names and dates, forming a gentle set of terraces, and, morbidly, space for hundreds if not thousands more. When Starfleet built a memorial, they built it to last. Cadets sometimes referred to it as the “Heroes of the Federation,” and damned if there wasn’t some truth in the flippant name.

The arrangement was chronological, so McCoy started down the path, passing the grassy terrace where he knew Captain Robau and George Kirk could be found. At the next terrace an empty wheelchair parked just off the path made his heart stutter all over again. He drew even with the chair and looked down the memorial. 

Jim. Sitting on the grass with his back against the wall, facing the ocean.

McCoy walked along the wall until he drew even with the other man, but Jim didn’t open his eyes. The name etched above Jim’s head was what McCoy had expected: _Admiral Christopher Pike_.

Turning his back to the wall and sliding down, he settled next to the other man and simply waited. It was a sunny afternoon and the grass underneath was fortunately dry; the white marble walls almost glowing in the light.

Eventually, without opening his eyes, Jim softly said, “I missed the funeral.”

“I think Spock went.” McCoy felt his own regret blossom in his chest. “I didn’t make it either. They showed some of it on the news that week.”

“I’ll bet they did. They always like to trot out the Heroes of the Federation when something bad happens.” Jim’s voice was more weary than bitter, and the doctor didn’t know what that meant.

McCoy could sense the inscription above them on the hill as if it were watching them: _Captain George Kirk, USS Kelvin_

The sun vanished behind clouds and the temperature noticeably dropped.

Against his shoulder, McCoy felt a faint shiver. “You’re cold.”

Eyes still closed, Jim replied, “I’m fine.”

Taking a risk, McCoy said, “No, you’re not.”

Jim shook his head, even as his face seemed to crumple. Pitching forward, he let his forehead slump against his knees as his shoulders started to shake.

McCoy frowned as Jim began to cry, silently, still clearly holding back. Raising a hand, he let it settle between the other man’s shoulder blades, rubbing softly. “Come on, Jim.” He only realised the turnabout afterwards. “Let it go.”

Jim did let out a sob then, and another, shoulders shuddering with the almost violent release. McCoy kept up the steady rubbing, trying to offer comfort without crossing any boundaries-- Jim’s posture was closed off; radiating the self-sufficiency that had made him the youngest starship captain in the fleet by a wide margin.

The same dogged self-sufficiency that could get him killed someday. McCoy frowned. Screw that.

Warily, worried he could be clipped by an elbow if Jim didn’t take it well, McCoy tugged the other man towards him. Jim resisted at first, but the doctor was persistent and wasn’t up against anything remotely like the other man’s normal level of strength. In truth, he didn’t know how Jim had made it the ten meters from his chair to their current place on the wall. McCoy had a brief glimpse of a red, wet face before Jim flopped sideways across his lap, curling up on top of the doctor’s thighs, facing towards the ocean.

McCoy buried his left hand in Jim’s hair while curling his right arm over the other man’s shoulder, splaying his hand on Jim’s chest.

Jim’s whole frame shuddered and McCoy simply held on, waiting. Eventually the shudders slowed: from sobs to shivers, but Jim didn’t seem inclined to move. The breeze had picked up, chasing thicker clouds in front of the sun and dropping the temperature further. 

McCoy was so absorbed in his tangled thoughts that he startled when something soft dropped over Jim and, by extension, him as well: a thick woven blanket with a pattern of diamonds and lines in soft browns, greens and blues. Desert colors.

Looking up, he found Philip Boyce standing over them. McCoy hadn’t even heard the other man approach.

Boyce was watching them with an unreadable expression on his face, thin blonde hair ruffled by the breeze. One hand was cupped at his side and McCoy craned his neck up to find it was full of small, loose blossoms. Antarian starflowers: the vivid blue petals an oddly familiar hue.

Jim stirred, drawing the blanket around his shoulders, then shifting as he realized someone else was there. Scrubbing a hand over his face as if it could help his composure, he wriggled to sit upright next to McCoy, blinking in the brighter light. He looked a mess: hair in disarray, face blotchy, tracks of tears and worse smeared on his cheeks and chin. Something in Boyce’s expression softened, regardless.

Jim looked blearily at the cloth covering his shoulder and his eyes widened in surprise as he muttered, “I remember this.”

“He had it on the Aldrin. Took it to every posting-- a reminder of home.” Boyce reached up and dropped the handful of flowers on top of the wall above Pike’s name. Some of the small blue blossoms tumbled down onto the seated men’s shoulders, releasing an earthen-smokey scent as they landed.

McCoy blinked in surprise and caught a blossom in his hand, inspecting it for a moment before gently setting it on the lawn. He suddenly understood the choice.

Boyce stepped over to Jim’s other side and gestured, “Come on, you two. Doctor’s orders. It’s about to rain.” He crouched and gripped Jim’s right biceps, pulling upwards when McCoy did the same on the other side. 

Between them, they got Jim shuffling back towards the path and McCoy breathed a sigh of relief that Boyce understood the need to walk to the chair rather than simply bringing it over. There was a flitter parked near the gates and Boyce directed them towards it without a word. When they exited the parking area, Boyce turned to the right instead of left and McCoy raised an eyebrow.

Without taking his eyes off the roadway, Boyce said, “You both look like you need a good meal.”

Jim was looking out the back seat window and didn’t seem inclined to comment, so McCoy held his tongue as well.

It wasn’t a long ride out of the city towards Pedro Point. Boyce turned at a sign for Shelter Cove and they pulled into a narrow driveway that ended at the door of a rancher built to hug the hillside. Jim’s wheelchair entered easily, McCoy realized there were still subtle signs of modification just for that purpose. The house was perched above the ocean, surrounded by trees on either side; large windows showing the incoming weather. The living room was open to the kitchen and dining area, a large stone fireplace partially separating the space.

Boyce was from somewhere back east, New York, McCoy thought, yet the decor was California through and through, and there was a tack trunk being used as a coffee table by a long sofa. Jim’s gaze flicked around the room, but it was only when it settled on a photo in the corner that his eyes widened. Pike and Boyce, side by side and smiling at the camera, hands between them loosely entwined.

Behind Boyce’s back, Jim raised an eyebrow that clearly conveyed, _Did you know this?_

McCoy replied with a shrug, not sure how to convey that he’d only recently become aware.

There was a wonderful smell throughout the house, and they trailed in Boyce’s wake into the large, open kitchen. With a wink at Jim, Boyce set three wine glasses on the counter and pulled a bottle of red out of a rack built into the wall. Sensing McCoy about to protest, he said, “Fortunately, Leonard, I outrank you. He can have half a glass.” 

Jim grinned and McCoy felt his objection evaporate at the sight.

Boyce pulled three large bowls out of a cabinet and passed them, along with utensils, to McCoy with a gesture to the long table in front of the window. 

Setting the table, McCoy paused for a moment to look at the dark clouds over the ocean. It was twilight now, the water turning an inky black. He turned back towards the kitchen to find Boyce lifting a cast iron pot out of the oven and onto the island. 

Removing the lid and avoiding a puff of steam, Boyce said, “I thought this would do me for a couple days; I hope you like Irish stew.” It smelled like heaven and must have been cooking for hours.

They took their seats and applied themselves to the food. The wine was marvellous as well; McCoy stole a glance at the label and just about choked when he saw the year.

Jim could only eat clumsily, but Boyce simply ignored the difficulty, along with anything that spattered onto his floor. Once they had put a dent in their dinner, conversation started slowly. First with compliments on the meal, then a few of Boyce’s more humorous cases from the last year, then tentative remembrances of Pike, from all of them, that grew increasingly more personal. McCoy was delighted to discover the other doctor had a wicked sense of humor coupled with a deadpan delivery.

By the time McCoy could see stars in the sky Jim was starting to droop forwards in his chair, Pike’s blanket still loosely over his shoulders. Before McCoy could suggest taking him home, Boyce said, “The sofa flattens into a bed if you press the button at the end. Why don’t you take the blanket and stretch out, Jim. There’s pillows there already.”

To McCoy’s surprise, Jim smiled, gratefully, and manoeuvred his chair into the other area. The doctors let him go alone, but both listened for the sound of him changing the sofa and transferring himself out of the chair. After a minute, Boyce gathered up the empty plates, motioning for McCoy to stay seated as he did so. Returning from the kitchen, he brandished a bottle of single malt and two glasses.

McCoy let out a low whistle of appreciation at the label and Boyce smiled, tilted his chin towards the front room, “Don’t let him know what I brought out after sending him to bed.”

“Never. Doctors have to stick together.”

“Damn right.”

Boyce poured a generous measure and they clinked glasses. After they each savored a sip, he couldn’t keep a sly smile off his features, “I gather you two have sorted some things out.”

McCoy’s cheeks pinked. “In a manner of speaking.”

Boyce snorted. “Then I owe Chris a drink. He’d have been a smug sonuva bitch if he could be here.”

The comment took a moment for McCoy to interpret, then he snorted as well, “You were betting against us?”

“We were both betting _for_ you, it was just a matter of timing.”

McCoy let his forehead fall to the table with a thunk, muttering into the grain of the wood, “Were we that transparent?”

“Mmmm,” Boyce took a swig and smirked, “more it was a pattern with which we had some familiarity.”

Tipping his head up, slightly, McCoy raised an eyebrow, “Do I want to know?”

The smirk turned into a fond smile, although something else glittered in Boyce’s eyes. “I was with that man for a long time. You should have seen him as a cadet: smart, cocky, handsome… reminds me of a certain someone. We didn’t get together at the academy, but I caught him drunk as a skunk, vomiting in the reflecting pond outside of HQ after flunking the Kobayashi Maru in his third year. I got him out of there before security turned up and that cemented the friendship. Spent the next six years patching him up on three different ships before we finally got together properly. Chris set standards for himself that no one could meet. He’d treat everyone on board like a human except for himself. When push came to shove I was there to pick up the pieces, and we realised what had been there all along.”

“How do you…” McCoy stumbled over the tense, but carried on anyway, “manage it? Him dashing into danger and you waiting to patch him up. Each time just hoping he’ll make it back?”

Boyce shrugged, “A man either lives life as it happens to him, meets it head-on and licks it, or he turns his back on it and starts to wither away.” He took another sip of scotch and added, truthfully, “Sometimes it just about kills you, but when you love ‘em you have to love all of them. Even the damned fool impulsive parts.” More softly, he continued, “You have to trust them, too, even when you’re the one easing away their doubts at night.”

McCoy nodded at the simple truth in the other man’s words and felt a weight lift from his shoulders, even though the thought of all that waiting and _hoping_ terrified him. A small price to pay, he thought. Remembering the feeling of Jim’s arms around him confirmed it; a small price to pay indeed.

They finished their glasses in companionable conversation and poured another drink as they continued: sorting through the best gossip among the medical personnel, a promising new technique for cellular regeneration, Jim’s recovery, the legends of Phlox’s exploits on the NX-01, confirmation that Boyce’s opinion of Raske was similar to McCoy’s.

McCoy couldn’t remember when he’d last spent hours talking with someone like that aside from Jim. As if they were friends. Eventually, Boyce drained his glass for the final time and squinted at the chrono in the kitchen. “It’s after midnight, Leonard. All good captains should be tucked into a proper bed.”

With a snort at the use of the word “good,” McCoy nodded and stretched before he stood.

Jim was stretched out with Pike’s blanket wrapped tightly around his shoulders and McCoy felt something twist in his chest. He looked so young. He _was_ young, still. Not even thirty. There was so much of the universe to explore and McCoy trembled at the thought of it: a nervous excitement he suddenly found hard to contain.

A hand on his shoulder and Jim woke quickly; a captain’s instinct when sleeping in an unfamiliar place. What would normally be a jerk to consciousness and guarded awareness was instead a stretch and a sleepy smile, cheek stroking along the soft weave of the blanket. Voice slightly gravelly with sleep, he asked, “Do I want to know what you’ve been talking about?”

“CMO things.” Boyce’s eyes twinkled as he shared a glance with McCoy. “Highly privileged information. Sorry.” He didn’t look sorry at all, and neither did McCoy.

When Jim moved to sit at the edge of the sofa, Boyce joined him. Gripping the young captain by the shoulders, the older man said, “The strength of a civilization is not measured by its ability to fight wars, but rather by its ability to prevent them. You did the right thing, son.”

McCoy’s breath caught in his throat, but Jim nodded, jerkily, then impulsively leaned forward and grabbed Boyce in a tight hug.

Boyce gave a mumble that might have been, “Oh, James,” and returned the embrace. It didn’t last long, but both men looked more relaxed when they pulled apart. 

Shifting, Jim made to hand back the blanket before transferring himself to the wheelchair.

Boyce smiled, but there was a sadness in his eyes. “Keep it.”

A tremulous smile was Jim’s reply, and a tightened grip on the blanket.

“Come on Jim,” McCoy wrapped an arm around the other man’s shoulders and held him close, “let’s go home.”

“Yeah, Bones.” Jim slipped his right hand into one of the other man’s and gave a gentle squeeze, “Home sounds good.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thanks everyone for your encouragement on my first foray into the fandom. It meant the world and now I’ve already got notes for at least one sequel so don’t think I’ll be stopping any time soon.


End file.
